The Reality of a Brat

Is Ann Coulter on crack or is she just an idiot? 

Firstly, you all can blame me and every other single mother out there for all of the problem’s in today’s society. The prison population, teen pregnancy, rapists and murders?  All my fault.

Now the current state of our government?  Well, now that is the fault of all women, because we should never be allowed to vote.  Apparently if women never voted, we would never have a Democrat as President.

Talk about batshit crazy.

Filed under: Everyday Life on January 7th, 2009 | No Comments »

Ok so Target screwed up with the pricing of Britax Marathon car seats. They mis-priced something on their website. God forbid, a human being goofed. Either it was supposed to be save $42 and $59 or it was supposed to be priced at $242 and $259. Either way, I am sure someone is jobless today because of it. I get really wanting one of the seats and being WAY disappointed to to have your order canceled. I would be too.

Lets say though that 10,000 seats were ordered (an easy number given the viral spreading of their links and the quantity some people were boasting about ordering). If Target did ship that many seats at the mistaken price, they are now out $2 million. That is a shit ton of money to lose on a human error, especially given that they have a disclaimer for exactly that reason. Given the current state of the economy, it would be difficult if not impossible for them to recoup their losses. Lets say on average, each customer ordered 2. That is 5,000 customers. If 50% of those now start a boycott (a high percentage) they lost 2,500 customers. If each of those customers spent $1600 at Target every quarter, the company could recoup its loss by giving the seats the low price but I don’t know too many people that spend $500/month at Target.

Boycott if you want, your definitely have every right to take your dollar to the place you believe has the best practices but in reality, if you boycott Target (for this) and Walmart (for its practices)… unless you have another option, some items are going to be 25-50% higher. Personally, I don’t have the income to pay that much for morals and ethics when we are talking about a mistake. It wasn’t intentional, there was no conspiracy theory, it was just an accident.

 The company has, fairly, deemed that no one will get a seat for that cost.  There were no finalized charges so in reality, no one is out anything but the false opportunity to get a $300 car seat for $60. Come on folks, its time to get over it and move on.

Filed under: Everyday Life on November 18th, 2008 | No Comments »

We survived “winter blast” (as it was dubbed),  but we didn’t fare too well.

Friday, the 40-80 mph winds started and we lost power around 8AM.  I left the house around 7:15 to take Alex to daycare and feed/let out a friend’s dogs.  By the time I got home at 8, the power was out and the fence was down in the back.  Because I have a greenbelt that borders my backyard, I have a HUGE backyard now!  The power stayed down until 3:30 or so.  I went to the store in search of a crank radio, some extra flashlights and clothing I could layer.  Most of the streetlights were down in my area, people not stopping like they should, etc. When the power did comeback up, I discovered my satellite was not working.  I called Direct TV and was told Thursday (6 days from the outage) was the soonest they could come out.  This experience is worthy of its own post and will get one.

The neighbors across from me came very close to losing the back end of their SUV to a large tree limb that came dow.  Thankfully, from what I have seen in our housing development, trees fell but missed homes and cars.  There is a canal that runs through our community that generally is dry.  Its around 6 feet wide and 3 feet deep.  It was full of angry rushing water and many of the gutters and drains were flooded and not moving.

There is a lot of clean up to day, at least one more round of storms on the way in but thankfully the worst of is it gone.  The wind isn’t expected to return thank goodness! If you are in the area, I hope you fared well and that you and your hoe are safe!

Filed under: Everyday Life on January 6th, 2008 | 3 Comments »

Things have been unbelivably crazy busy!  I am truly hoping that now the holidays are over and I can get back to being on a normal schedule!  Christmas was really nice.  Alex and I both got a lot of great presents.  Alex loves his kitchen, I got a new coat and a few books, some cutlery and a couple of nice key holders. Santa was good to Alex in a BIG way.

Filed under: Everyday Life on January 2nd, 2008 | 1 Comment »

I need to get a new ISP. I am not thrilled with the one I have but the house I live in is so old (think 1950’s) that I am not sure if fiber cable has been laid in the area to support the provider I want to switch to. This is definitely something to research this week while I am on vacation. Woohoo! Vacation!

Filed under: Everyday Life on December 23rd, 2007 | No Comments »

Wow. Its been awhile. We got hit with Rotavirus the week before last and since then it has been a game of playing catch up and clean up. After 4 days of toddler puking, a day of me puking… well, the house was thrashed. He and I are both feeling much better although wouldn’t you know it, he has a cold just in time for Christmas.

I am very excited to be playing Santa this year. Last year was fun but well, there was a great deal of excitement on my part and a lot of apathy on his. Hey can you blame him? He wasn’t even 8 months old. This year though, he seems very interested and into everything Christmas related.

We had a great time at my dad’s house last night. Alex did get overwhelmed but he had a lot of fun and got completely spoiled. As did I. I am so grateful that relationship is growing and developing again. It warms my heart immensely. We loved all the presents we received and the ones we gave were appreciated too.

A friend of mine just had to hire a Raleigh personal injury lawyer because of a nasty car accident she was in. Please say a prayer for her that she is able to get enough of a settlement to cover her medical bills.

Filed under: Everyday Life on December 23rd, 2007 | No Comments »

You know its bad when your child goes through 4 pairs of pajamas in one night puking

You know its bad when you pray for just 1 hour of nothing to clean up

You know its bad when you are excited about getting to go to work on a Monday morning.

We got hit with a stomach virus last week. Nine months of morning sickness and throwing up combined was better than that. For both he and I. I got it Thursday night, it left me literally wish I would die it was that bad. Thankfully his godmother came and took him for the night so I could puke in peace.

He was sick starting Tuesday night and finally finishing Thursday morning. It made for a long week for both of us and I think we both looked forward to the return to our normal schedules.

His Ped asked me on Thursday when I took him in if I was planning on any more. I said not without a set of wedding rings coming first. This single mom thing is just plain hard!

Filed under: parenting on December 17th, 2007 | 1 Comment »

I put my resume on Monster a long long time ago. I reactivated it when redeployments were happening with my company. Lately, I have been getting so much spam mail with everything from owning my own real estate franchise to running a vending machine route. I was shocked at some of the numbers they claim you can make your first year out. It all sounds way too good to be true and probably is.

Filed under: Everyday Life on December 12th, 2007 | No Comments »

I talked to a dear friend today. She and her husband are in the process of selling their Wilmington NC real estate. He got pretty sick last year as being self employed, the medical bills are killing them. Say a prayer or 2 for them. They will come out ok but they could use the strength right now.

Filed under: prayer on December 12th, 2007 | No Comments »

My poor baby was throwing up all last night, this morning and into early afternoon. He couldn’t even keep water down. I feel for the little guy. He would get so scared when he threw up. You would think by now he would be getting used to it. If he loses much more weight he is going to need some a href=”http://store.bodybuildingfactory.com”>bodybuilding supplements to catch up!

Filed under: parenting on December 12th, 2007 | No Comments »

One of the downsides to being the only female in our lab is that frequently I am asked where things are. Not major things but it gets sort of old pretty fast. When you are constantly asked where a certain piece of equipment is or where the box cutters are… well, it makes one want to make a map and tell people to follow it!

Filed under: work on December 11th, 2007 | No Comments »

One of the guys at work is an intern and well, being a full time student most of the time and taking a semester off to work has left him pretty poor. We were talking and I guess his apartment is typical college guy type thing. You know the place, remnant furniture, pizzas boxes and the like. I recommended a few discount furniture stores to him in the area to upgrade. I can’t imagine the reaction he gets from any women that come in there!

Filed under: Everyday Life on December 11th, 2007 | No Comments »

Wine has a huge part of history. It was turned into water by Jesus, it was a a source of commerce (and later, politics) in many of the European countries. Its at old as time and revered by many.

I had the opportunity to partake in a wine tasting of sorts. The problem is, I don’t drink. At all. No, really, not ever. I have lots of friends that do though and many of them are wine connoisseurs. They can tell a dry wine, one by its age and what type of meal goes with which color, vintage and label.

I give you their expertise, written by me with their opinions. I was presented with these 2 bottles.

The Belvedere, a chardonnay was not recommended due to the overwhelming oak taste. This may also be a personal preference in the taste of wine of the consumer. It also had a strong after taste which added to a negative experience drinking it.

The Bradford mountain wine, a red Zinfandel, was highly enjoyable. It was perfect in it’s dryness yet had a robust fruity flavor. This is a wine that will do well with a meal of roast of lamb or even barbecued chicken.

With the wine came a very informative newsletter with information about the vineyards and wine tasting in general. They also offer a wine of the month that allows members to sample a new wine every month. For any avid wine lover, this is a must have for the Christmas season. I was very pleased to be able to take part in this sampling.

Filed under: Everyday Life on December 11th, 2007 | No Comments »