Emily Bloss

The other day I found this very interesting craft - you use #6 plastic to make a design and then shrink it in the oven. Very cool! This morning I noticed the sprout containers are #6, so when it’s empty, I’m going to see what I can make from the package. Should be interesting!

Do It Yourself Shrinky Dinks

Today, I found a nice little reference guide which I printed out and posted in our kitchen, along with our CPR guide:

Chart of First Aid Procedures

Now, if I can just remember to look at it when something happens!

Bleys turned 18 today. Yay!! Welcome to the adult world. This is the cake we had for lunch. :) We were trying to figure out how old those candles are, because after we blow them out, we pluck the candles from the cake, suck the cake and frosting off the end, and then wash them and put them back in in the cupboard for the next celebration. I’m thinking they’re at least 5 years old, maybe more. They still work great, though!

Tonight we’re going out to dinner with his Gramma Pris, down to Captain Jack’s in Tarpon Springs. They have awesome Mango BBQ Shrimp, which is what Bleys wants for his special dinner. Afterwards we’ll take a stroll across the bridge over to the heart of Tarpon Springs, Dodecanese Avenue, which has a whole bunch of greek shops and restaurants. Then we’ll come home and eat more cake!! Other than that, not much is going on - he wants to “lounge” for his birthday. Monday he’s going to the county offices to register to vote and for (gulp) the Selective Service. Should be fun!

We’re in the process of switching our web sites to a new web host, where the database is faster. Because I was using the built-in blog on the old host, I don’t get to keep the design. But I like the new one pretty well and will be tweaking it to make it just right. And I have to put the pictures back, but that’s no big deal. It will be nice having control over my stuff, though… I was kind of being held hostage by using the built-in stuff on the old host! I couldn’t upgrade or add anything, so this is a good thing. I can mess up my blog in all kinds of new and different ways!

Not really, but it’s fun to pretend. The weather here in Florida can get pretty wacky. I’m currently reading a book about it, and the author states there are really no “average” weather patterns to be discerned from Florida’s records… it’s too unpredictable at any time of year to get any really good data. So I had to take this article with a rather large grain of salt:

Predict the Weather Without a Forecast

Recently we bought a weather radio, which is supposed to sound an alarm in case of hazardous weather. Luckily it hasn’t done anything yet, and hopefully we’ll never know if it works. But it’s good to be prepared in the tornado capital of the country.

I’m cleaning out my email, and found another gem from my Dad….

This will boggle your mind, I know it did mine!
The year is 1907. One hundred years ago.
What a difference a century makes!
Here are some  statistics for the Year 1907:
************************************

• The average life expectancy was 47 years.
• Only 14 percent of the homes had a bathtub.
• Only 8 percent of the homes had a telephone.
• There were only 8,000 cars and only 144 miles of paved roads.
• The maximum speed limit in most cities was 10 mph.
• The tallest structure in the world was the Eiffel Tower!
• The average wage in 1907 was 22 cents per hour.
• The average  worker made between $200 and $400 per year.
• A competent accountant could expect to earn $2000 per year, a dentist $2,500 per year, a veterinarian between $1,500 and $4,000 per year, and a mechanical engineer about $5,000 per year.
• More than 95 percent of all births took place at home.
• Ninety percent of all doctors had NO COLLEGE EDUCATION! Instead, they attended so-called medical schools, many of which were condemned in the press AND the government as “substandard.”
• Sugar cost four cents a pound.
• Eggs were fourteen cents a dozen.
• Coffee was fifteen cents a pound.
• Most women only washed their hair once a month, and used Borax or egg yolks for shampoo.
• Canada! passed a law that prohibited poor people from entering into their country for any reason.
• Five leading causes of death  were:
  1. Pneumonia and influenza
  2. Tuberculosis
  3. Diarrhea
  4. Heart disease
  5. Stroke
• The American flag had 45 stars.
• The population of Las Vegas, Nevada, was only 30!!!!
• Crossword puzzles, canned beer, and ice tea hadn’t been invented yet.
• There was no Mother’s Day or Father’s Day.
• Two out of every 10 adults couldn’t read or write.
• Only 6 percent of all Americans had graduated from high school.
• Marijuana, heroin, and morphine were all available over the counter at the local corner drugstores. Back then pharmacists said, “Heroin clears the complexion, gives buoyancy to the mind, regulates the stomach and bowels, and is, in fact, a perfect  guardian of health.”
• Eighteen percent of households had at least one full-time servant or domestic help.
• There were about 230 reported murders in the ENTIRE ! U.S.A. !

Try to imagine what it may be like in another 100 years. (Personally, I just hope we’re still here by then.)

My Dad recently sent me a link to a very interesting site - Thanks, Dad!!

World Clock

The whole site is great. I really like this guy’s ideas, especially some of them in his article Letting Go of Doing and the suggestion of thinking of our lives in days rather than years, because a day is a lot easier to get a handle on. And I used the Life Expectancy Calculator and it said I’ll live to be 90, if I’m lucky! I guess it’ll be a while before I become a number on the clock.

I’ve been working so much the last week I haven’t had time for much else. Today I got to take some time and go do stuff I’ve been wanting to do - I had a very full and fulfilling day! I spent some of my birthday money on a 7 comic book series called The Gunslinger Born… Stephen King has continued the Dark Tower series with the story of how Roland became a gunslinger. I already looked at the first one - the pictures are beautiful and the extra stories are awesome.

I also did a bunch of running around… one stop was at the vet to get cat food. They have so many cats there, it’s just wonderful. There’s a couple I would bring home if we needed more kitties. We buy special food at the vet because our cats are so fat, and it’s working! Stripe has already lost a little more than a pound since we switched. And they seem to like it so it’s all good.

The rest of my stops were Auto Zone for oil for the car, Bed Bath & Beyond just to browse (I looked at silpat silicone baking mats but they were too expensive at the moment) and also checked out Bells Home Outlet and didn’t buy anything at either store! That’s gotta be a record. After that I went to get litter at Pet Food Warehouse and then decided to check out the hardware store at the other end of the shopping plaza. That was the best stop of the day!!! As I went in, I read a sign that said “No other dogs” and I was like, “Hmm, I wonder what that’s about.” And the moment I stepped in I understood. Laying in the middle of the aisle were three St. Bernards!! They didn’t even react when I came in, just kinda looked up at me. And of course, I had to go see them. What sweet dogs, they were really nice, and so soft. One of them was really old, and he had the biggest paws I’ve ever seen on a dog. They were just HUGE!! The guy said that dog was living on love, so I hope I gave him an extra day on this earth with the love he got from me today.

After that I stopped at the library to give them some magazines to sell - they have a table where you can buy magazines for a quarter. I love being able to recycle AND help the library! Plus I’m trying to dejunk our house some, it’s starting to get cluttered and I want to take care of it before things get out of control. If I’m not using something, it’s getting donated, recycled or pitched! I have to be very careful not to be too much of a packrat, I just love to collect things I think may be useful someday.

Then I came home, helped cook dinner, watched the second to last episode of Hell’s Kitchen, did the dishes, went out and weeded a little bit for the papaya and mango plants I have to go in the ground and then watched a little more of “The Astronaut Farmer” with Trav. Now I’m posting here and still hope to play a little WordTopia, if anybody’s around (sometimes later at night there’s nobody to play with).

So that’s my busy, busy day. Tomorrow it’s back to work. Thanks for reading!