A few days ago I found myself driving down a rural road near where I live that I had never driven down before. I had never gone down there before simply because I never had the need to go down there. I knew it was there, I just never paid it much attention. Well, this particular day there was a road block and detour that caused me to HAVE to drive down that road. The road was narrow, gravel, and very twisty-turny. At first I was aggravated that I had to drive down the road; it was rather badly washboarded and it was slowing me down! However I was really rather amused when about a mile down the road I saw a road sign that said “swan crossing.”
I’ve seen “deer crossing” and “moose crossing” signs before, but never “swan crossing” signs. Well, immediately after the next turn, sure enough, there were three swans walking across the road! There were two beautiful ponds with waterfalls on both sides of the road, with swans in both of them. Some of them were simply switching from one pond to the next. These swans had wide gold bands around their necks. I had to wonder who put the bands on them, and if it was simply a declaration of ownership, or some kind of scientific research! Either way, I was glad I went down the road and experienced the swan crossing!
Every now and then my wife and I go to the “big mall” that is over an hour’s drive from home. It’s a rare treat to go there; we usually only go there two or three times a year. We try to go on a day when we think it won’t be busy because we don’t like trying to fight the crowds and stand in line at the cash register for a long period of time.
But the big mall has some specialty stores in it that we just can’t go to locally, and we like going to them when we can. That’s when we stock up on my wife’s favorite reed diffuser oil, handmade soap, and aloe vera products . We try to go to the Sabon bath and beauty store for those products because my wife likes their products best. She says the fragrances don’t give her a headache the way other store’s products do!
She likes to use these types of items in gift baskets that she makes up to give to people on gift giving occasions, as well as use them throughout our own house. She loves how the reed diffusers can fragrance a room without having to burn any candles, or plug in anything electrical.
My sister has been complaining to me about how she has been trying to refinance the mortgage on her house. She has been talking with several financing companies, and she thought that she had one lined up to get her the loan that she wanted. She had sent them all of the information they had requested, and they said that they would call her back the next day to make an appointment for an appraiser, and to get her credit card information to charge the appraisal fee. They never called back! That was two weeks ago, and now she is worried that they were some kind of scam artist trying to get her personal information. I think she may be right! She’s been sending them emails asking them what’s going on and they don’t bother to respond. Very unsettling, and very rude!
As my parents get older, they have been having more difficulty navigating around their house. My mother is on oxygen 24 hours a day, and tires easily. When we go out shopping, or out to dinner, we have to stop frequently to let her rest. So my wife and I are considering buying an electric wheelchair for her to use.
Having something like that would enable us to take her a lot more places. We’d really enjoy taking her to shows and family parties, but it has been a major effort to do that in the past.
There are so many different options available to her; I’d like to get one that folds easily and fits into the trunk of my car. Something like the Breeze electric travel scooter from the thescooterstore.com website would be perfect!
My wife was telling me that she read an article recently about how women are not only treated unfairly in the workplace, but also in the markeplace. Research has shown that when negotiation for a new car, white men are the most likely to get the best prices, followed by african-american men, followed by white women, followed by african-american women. Lesson? If you want to buy a new car, women should bring along a white man to do the negotiating for them so they will get the better deal! That’s certainly a sad state of affairs!
General life, Pets, Travel | Dean | 
May 31, 2009 5:17 pm | 
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