Friday, February 27, 2009

I Pledge.........

This is my only grandSON......today he stood in front of me and started moving his hands and reciting the Pledge of Allegiance (he is only 5) and some of his words were mis-pronounced and I realized he was "signing" as he spoke. What a neat thing for his PreK teacher to do, teach the kids the pledge and signing at the same time!

posted by Grannyann at 6:56 PM 1 Comments

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Top Ten Favorite Words

I remember as a kid, my friend and I created a word -
"albatroticsignetica" - we never did create a meaning, just the word. Funny I remember that after all these years. Here are some, others have thought up and use.

Top Ten Favorite Words (Not in the Dictionary) according to Merriam-Webster

1. ginormous (adj): bigger than gigantic and bigger than enormous
2. confuzzled (adj): confused and puzzled at the same time
3. woot (interj): an exclamation of joy or excitement
4. chillax (v): chill out/relax, hang out with friends
5. cognitive displaysia (n): the feeling you have before you even leave the house that you are going to forget something and not remember it until you're on the highway
6. gription (n): the purchase gained by friction: "My car needs new tires because the old ones have lost their gription."
7. phonecrastinate (v): to put off answering the phone until caller ID displays the incoming name and number
8. slickery (adj): having a surface that is wet and icy
9. snirt (n): snow that is dirty, often seen by the side of roads and parking lots that have been plowed
10. lingweenie (n): a person incapable of producing neologisms (a new word, meaning, usage, or phrase.)

posted by Grannyann at 7:56 AM 3 Comments

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

More of Grannys Thoughts on the News

Another day in the news... A team led by a researcher from the University of California-Los Angeles said that Osama bin Laden is probably living in a walled compound in the Pakistani town of Parachinar, near the Afghanistan border. The researchers based their conclusion on geographic analytical tools used to locate fugitive criminals and endangered species. Then they tell the WHOLE WORLD what they think. Now do you figure Bin Laden is not going to hear about this and move? That is almost as dumb as the other day when the police told about catching a bunch of criminals by sending them a notice that they had won something and to come and get it. Guess they shot that trick in the foot. Too bad because I understand it worked good. Has anyone thought about the fact that Nancy Pelosi is third in line for President? Cross your fingers that nothing happens to Obama or Biden. Gads that would be a horrific situation. She can't even get her version of the meeting with the Pope to match his. I think I would believe him first. I understand he did not like her views, as a government leader, on abortion! (she is a Catholic). Oooops now the OctuMom is looking at a million dollar home (and all of a sudden the man shows up who says he donated sperm - what a coincidence since he didn't show up when her moms house was up for foreclosure). Guess she got someone to pay her for a book, pictures or a reality show. Famed attorney, Gloria Allred, is now in the mix. On behalf of a group known as Angels in Waiting, Allred has made an offer to OctuMom to provide ’round the clock care for all of the babies who will most assuredly need it when they come home from the hospital. That care would take the finances off the backs of taxpayers. They have given her until Thursday to answer. I would have thought she would have jumped on this - it is FREE!!!! Could the money been behind this whole thing from the very first IVF? Hummmmm I wonder!!!!

posted by Grannyann at 7:51 AM 0 Comments

Saturday, February 21, 2009

Fallout Shelters Again?

Well talk about daja vu... Public planners in southwest Wyoming's Sweetwater County — a sagebrush expanse roughly the size of Massachusetts — say the contractor hired for the project has told them it intends to build a 22,000-square-foot underground storage vault to store documents. Whose documents exactly? Apparently, the writings of the late L. Ron Hubbard, the Church of Scientology's founder, and other church records. The sale of fallout shelters (or as some of us called them "Fraidie Holes") and fear of nuclear fallout is not anything new. It reached its paranoiac peak in the 1950s, continued in the schizophrenic ‘60s and eased off in the self-satisfying 70s. I grew up as part of the "duck and cover" generation. Duck-and-cover practice was routine in every American schoolhouse. The bomb had become a familiar, unnerving part of our life. We were watching nuclear war themes such as: Dr. Strangelove, Or How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the Bomb, The Last Man On Earth, The Day the World Ended and The Atomic Kid at the movies. Even though we had hula-hoops, lava lamps, go-carts and go-go boots, a doomsday mentality prevailed. Some years later, I remember in 62 as my then husband, who was in the military, had to pack his duffle bags and have them sitting in the hallway ready for deployment at a moments notice. Kennedy's speech about the Cuban Crisis was really unnerving to say the least. At that time, we were living just off an Air Force Base in San Antonio in the town of Schertz, one of those places with a bar, a furniture store, a gas station and 13 people that weren't military. As an angry Nikita Khrushchev dispersed Soviet warships to Cuba, a military showdown with the U. S. seemed imminent. We sure didn't sleep much that night and those memories are as clear as the day Kennedy was shot (another unforgettable day and story).

posted by Grannyann at 11:13 AM 1 Comments

Friday, February 20, 2009

Grannys Slant on the News

Oh no not another....I just saw on ABC that there was another "miracle on the water" back in the 50s (I think) and in an ocean somewhere. Same type of landing, 33 on board, stood on the wings and ships came and got them. As if we haven't heard about the Miracle on the Hudson enough, now here is an old one just like it. I sometimes wonder why the news can not find something new to report on. One thing happens and we hear about it for weeks and weeks. How much can you redo the news so its not boring---not much. Now we will hear about the chimp that hurt the lady, we heard about the stimulus (?) for weeks, we heard about the catastrophe that was going to happen if they did not pass it right then (they did and then it was 4 days before signing and no catastrophe happened anyway. I think I need to worry more about getting hit by a piece of meteorite rather than a catastrophe). Now we will be hearing about the "OctuMom" for months and someone needs to check this lady - I see she was shopping and buying lipstick for $14 at Nordstroms today when they were sent a letter of foreclosure on their home. She could have gotten a lipstick for $3 at WalMart or Dollar General and have you noticed her fingernails when she is touching the babies? I think French manicures cost a mint. Then there is the Pres who is riding around in AF one to give a speech when it costs millions of dollars to fly that plane on each trip - thought the US was in dire straights due to financial problems. Rahm needs to tell the Pres there is such a thing as speeches by Video. Then there is ANOTHER guy who has gotten off with billions of his clients monies. Is there no end to thieves in the stock business? Plus they say when we hear about what is on the banks books, we will just sh____! I am wondering just how many Congressmen and Senators have not paid their taxes. There is the little girl missing in Florida, but you know, if I lived in an area with 50 or 60 sexual predators, I would definitely move before something like that happens to someone I love. Then the cherry on top of all this (for this week) is, Blago is still around. I had spent 10 days in the hospital when all that started and what else is there to do in the hospital but watch the news. I can almost tell you how he combs his hair, what he jogs in and how many times he AND Senator Burris have said "I have done nothing wrong.." Wow I can hardly wait for next week.

posted by Grannyann at 8:17 AM 2 Comments

Thursday, February 19, 2009

Living on $1,500 for one year

On the news tonight I saw where a family of four is trying to live on $1,500 for one year and she is going to blog about it. I checked out her blog and found lots of good ideas that a lot of people can use. With the economy the way it is this might just help a lot of families.

Living on $1,500 for one year

"On 1/1/09, my family (2 adults, 1 preschooler and 1 toddler) decided to create the challenge to live on $1,500 for one year for groceries, household items and personal expenses (haircuts, medical co pays). I started diligently using coupons in July 2008, and we built up a decent stockpile last year. Our 2009 goal is to make the most of what we have in our household and see if it is really possible for four people to survive on $1,500 for one year.

There are a "rules" we have established with this challenge - We will maintain a healthy lifestyle for our family, be completely honest when reporting our spending and savings, maintain a $0 dining out budget until our 7th wedding anniversary (12/28/09), have a minimum of five $0 days per month (days when we do not spend any money) and subtract any "found money" (survey $$, unexpected gifts, etc.) from our current spending.

In addition to our daily progress, I will also blog about current deals and rebates, parenting tips, cooking on a budget and other interesting topics that come up!"

To accomplish their goal Heather and Bourne Spooner have developed a new system of shopping that includes stockpiling foods and paying close attention to coupons and sales.

Check our her site and you will be surprised how many good ideas you will find that might help you also.


Attn: her website has closed down, if it reopens we will let you know

posted by Grannyann at 11:08 AM 1 Comments

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

I Can't Help Myself.......

I did it again. It's been a long time but I couldn't resist. We were in a store yesterday and I saw some spiral notebooks on sale so I got two. Forever I have loved notebooks, diaries, etc. I think I got it from my mother who loved them too. I always have intentions of writing something, a journal, recopying a messy notebook or whatever, but I never do. My mom had written in journals for years. I have stacks and stacks of them that I haven't gone through yet. I hadn't realized she had been writing them for so long until after she died and I found them. She put me to shame, mine are all blank, with good intentions. At least it's cheaper than buying jewelry!

posted by Grannyann at 11:50 AM 2 Comments

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Things only Martha Stewart would know:

* Stuff a miniature marshmallow in the bottom of a sugar cone to prevent ice cream drips.
* Use a meat baster to "squeeze" your pancake batter onto the hot griddle and you'll get perfectly shaped pancakes every time.
* To keep potatoes from budding, place an apple in the bag with the potatoes.
* To prevent egg shells from cracking, add a pinch of salt to the water before hard boiling.
* Run your hands under cold water before pressing Rice Krispiest treats in the pan and the marshmallow won't stick to your fingers.
* To get the most juice out of fresh lemons, bring them to room temperature and roll them under your palm against the kitchen counter before squeezing.
* To easily remove burnt on food from your skillet, simply add a drop or two of dish soap and enough water to cover bottom of pan, and bring to a boil on stove top.
* Spray your Tupperware with nonstick cooking spray before pouring in tomato based sauces and there won't be any stains.
* When a cake recipe calls for flouring the baking pan, use a bit of the dry cake mix instead and there won't be any white mess on the outside of the cake.
* If you accidentally over salt a dish while it's still cooking, drop in a peeled potato and it will absorb the excess salt for an instant "fix me up."
* Wrap celery in aluminum foil when putting in the refrigerator and it will keep for weeks.
* Place a slice of apple in hardened brown sugar to soften it.
* When boiling corn on the cob, add a pinch of sugar to help bring out the corn's natural sweetness.
* To determine whether an egg is fresh, immerse it in a pan of cool, salted water. If it sinks, it is fresh, but if it rises to the surface, throw it away.
* Cure for headaches: Take a lime, cut it in half and rub it on your forehead. The throbbing will go away.
* Don't throw out all that leftover wine. Freeze into ice cubes for future use in casseroles and sauces.
* If you have a problem opening jars: Try using latex dishwashing gloves. They give a non slip grip that makes opening jars easy.
* To get rid of itch from mosquito bites, try applying soap on the area and you will experience instant relief.
* Ants, ants, ants everywhere ... Well, they are said to never cross a chalk line. So get your chalk out and draw a line on the floor or wherever ants tend to march. See for yourself.
* Use air freshener to clean mirrors. It does a good job and better still, leaves a lovely smell to the shine.
* When you get a splinter, reach for the scotch tape before resorting to tweezers or a needle. Simply put the scotch tape over the splinter, then pull it off. Scotch tape removes most splinters painlessly and easily.

posted by Grannyann at 7:31 PM 2 Comments

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Valentine Date???

Festival of love celebrated February 15th, not 14th

Valentine's Day originates from the ancient Roman fertility festival of Lupercalia, which was celebrated on 15 February in honour of the gods Lupercus and Faunus, as well as the legendary founders of Rome, Romulus and Remus. During the festival, young men would draw the names of women from a box, and each couple would be paired until next year's celebration. Often they would fall in love and marry.

At around 270AD Rome was facing battles and civil uprising. The men were not keen to join the army. Emperor Claudius II believed that the men did not want to leave their loved ones and summarily cancelled all marriages and engagements. Two priests, Valentine and Marius, disobeyed the decree and secretly performed marriage ceremonies. Valentine was caught on 14 February and dragged to jail. Later in the day he was clubbed to death and beheaded. It is said that, before his execution, Valentine himself had fallen in love with the jailer's daughter. He signed his final note to her, "From your Valentine."

Valentine's Day

In 391AD, Emperor Theodosius I declared Christianity as the official religion of the Rome. The fertility festival was celebrated until 496AD when Pope Gelasius replaced it with a similar celebration. For patron saint of the celebration, he chose the "lovers" saint, St Valentine. He also moved the date of the celebration from the 15 February to the date of St Valentine's death, 14 February. Through the centuries, Valentines Day became to be remembered more as the festival of love instead of a religious day. In 1969 it was dropped from the Roman Catholic calendar as a designated feast day.

Happy Valentine's!

Esther Howland, the woman who produced the first commercial American valentines in the 1840s, sold a then mind-boggling $5,000 in cards her first year of business. Today, over 1 billion valentine cards are sent in the US - second in number only to Christmas cards.

posted by Grannyann at 5:00 PM 1 Comments

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

List of Things that should go AWAY in 2009

1. Exercise machines or equipment and the models who advertise them (the average person doesn't look like that - and won't look like that after using the product)!
2. People who "Yell" at you in commercials.
3. Members of the Congress and Senate that have been there longer than 12 years
4. People who talk on cell phones while driving
5. People who park in their front yards

If you have something you think should go away, add it under comments.

posted by Grannyann at 7:45 PM 1 Comments

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Things Our Parents Said in 1959........

* "I'll tell you one thing, if things keep going the way they are, its' going to be impossible to buy a weeks groceries for $20."
* "Have you seen the new cars coming out next year? It won't be long when $5000 will only buy a used one."
* "If cigarettes keep going up in price, I'm going to quit. A quarter a pack is ridiculous."
* "Did you hear the post office is thinking about charging a dime just to mail a letter?"
* The drive-in restaurant is convenient in nice weather, but I seriously doubt they will ever catch on."
* "If they raise the minimum wage to $1, nobody will be able to hire outside help at the store."
* "When I first started driving, who would have thought gas would someday cost 50 cents a gallon. Guess we'd be better off leaving the car in the garage."
* "Kids today are impossible. Those duck tail hair cuts make it impossible to stay groomed. Next thing you know, boys will be wearing their hair as long as the girls."
* "Also, their music drives me wild. This 'Rock Around The Clock' thing is nothing but racket."
* "I'm afraid to send my kids to the movies any more. Ever since they let Clark Gable get by with saying 'damn' in 'Gone With The Wind,' it seems every movie has a 'hell' or a 'damn' in it."
* "Anymore no one can afford to be sick, $35 a day in the hospital is too rich for my blood."
* "I don't know about you but if they raise the price of coffee to 15 cents, I'll just have to drink mine at home."
* "Pretty soon you won't be able to buy a good 10 cent cigar."
* "I read the other day where some scientist thinks it's possible to put a man on the moon by the end of the of the century. They even have some fellows they call astronauts preparing for it down in Texas."
* "Did you see where some baseball player just signed a contract for $75,000 a year just to play ball? It wouldn't surprise me if someday they'll be making more than the president."
* "Do you suppose television will ever reach our part of the country?"
* "I never thought I'd see the day all our kitchen appliances would be electric. They are even making electric typewriters now."
* "It's too bad things are so tough nowadays. I see where a few married women are having to work to make ends meet."
* "It won't be long before young couples are going to have to hire someone to watch their kids so they can both work."
* "Marriage doesn't mean a thing anymore, Those Hollywood stars seem to be getting divorced at the drop of a hat."
* " I'll tell you one thing. If my kid ever talks back to me, they won't be able to sit down for a week."
* "Did you know the new church in town is allowing women to wear slacks to their service?"
* "Next thing you know is, the government will start paying us not to grow crops."
* "I'm just afraid the Volkswagen car is going to open the door to a whole lot of foreign business."
* "Thank goodness I won't live to see the day when the Government takes half our income in taxes. I sometimes wonder if we are electing the best people to congress."

posted by Grannyann at 6:15 PM 2 Comments

Thursday, February 5, 2009

My Cabinet Knobs Need Updating?????

I love watching HGTV. I seem to watch a lot of the "My House is Worth What?" episodes. I really wonder how those people can keep their house looking like no one lives there. Everything is so spic and span, no dust, no clutter at all, nothing on the kitchen counter, not even a newspaper, mail or book laying around. I wonder where people get sums of money like $30,000 for a kitchen make over or $20,000 for a redo on the bathroom. Do people just have that much laying around that they won't need for retirement, kids college, fix the car, emergencies, etc? I have, I think what you'd call a "craftsman" home, built sometime in the 30's. I am currently on the plumber list to get a new sewer pipe as my old clay one seems to have died sometime ago from tree root invasion. Now some of my meager savings goes to things like that. I recently got a new gas stove and a new Fridge with an ice maker. I felt I deserved an ice maker at my age. My old stove worked but didn't have the updated tubing so while I got new tubing I got a new stove. The hauling guys said they had never seen a stove as big as my old one and they haul for Sears everyday. Once I started using the new stove I see why they said it was big. I hardly have room for a skillet on my new stove. Plus against HGTV's great advice they are not stainless steel and don't match my microwave (have you priced stainless steel lately?). I am afraid everything I have in my kitchen is NOT what a buyer would consider "up-to-date", i.e., cabinet door knobs, floor tiles, marble counter tops and I have a country theme and wallpaper which is a no-no. My bathroom is old fashioned and it is not a "master bath" attached to a "master suite". I have five grandchildren, of which three are below the age of 7 so I seem to always have clutter, the screen on my front door screen needs redone (too many hands have pushed on it). I love my house tho, because I have bedrooms twice as big as most homes, I have high ceilings without having asked for them (don't people know heating bills would be cheaper with lower ceilings), I have an attached carport, and I have a screened in front porch where I spend summers plus I have room for all my garage sale finds!

posted by Grannyann at 2:28 PM 1 Comments

Monday, February 2, 2009

Fresh Bread?

When you go to buy bread in the grocery store, have you ever wondered which is the freshest, so you "squeeze" for freshness or softness? Did you know that bread is delivered fresh to the stores five days a week? Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Each day has a different color twist tie. They are:

Monday = Blue,
Tuesday = Green,
Thursday = Red
Friday = White and Saturday = Yellow.

So if today was Thursday, you would want red twist tie; not white which is Fridays (almost a week old)! The colors go alphabetically by color Blue- Green - Red - White - Yellow, Monday through Saturday. Very easy to remember. I thought this was interesting. I looked in the grocery store and the bread wrappers do have different twist ties, and even the ones with the plastic clips have different colors. You learn something new everyday! Enjoy fresh bread when you buy bread with the right color on the day you are shopping.

posted by Grannyann at 8:34 AM 1 Comments