Thanks for all the well wishes on behalf of my BIL. I think he is going to be just fine. He is probably to ornery to die yet. Love him. He is a great guy but at 73 he is still a cad.
I got a "collect call" this morning from the Harris County Jail!

Couldn't think of anyone I knew there and even if I did I decided I probably did not need to be talking to them anyway. Turns out there have been a lot of people getting the same sort of call in our area. Some scam that ends up charging your phone. Pretty unusual way for me to start my day.
Kitty, those Disney Dream Weddings are beautiful but it is just crazy what some people will pay for a wedding. Not exactly proud of it but I am on my 3rd marriage. I've done the huge ceremony, a small one and also just showed up in from of the JP. Doesn't really matter which way you go or how much money you put into it. Just make sure you put the right people into it! BTW, the small ceremony was the one that actually took. I like your idea of putting that much excess money towards a house!
Sukie, your DH must really love that snow! Mine used to think that he wanted to live in Colorado but I think he has finally decided that even he does not like the cold that much.
JOCAmom, staying in where it's warm sounds like a good plan! Cold is one thing but when the wind is involved it is so much worse.
Awww, a vow renewal would be really sweet.
Mkgaapril, nice to meet you. I think I may have showed up to the thread just about the time you went AWOL. Anyway, hopefully I will be seeing more of you around.
My DH brings home those coffee packs from the hotels too. So far the coffee supply here at home has never got so low I had to dig those up but it is nice to know they can be handy in case of emergency.
Pikester, you are right. I think it is a trade off where ever you live that you get some sort of bad weather. Texas, of course, we get tornadoes. We do have poisonous snakes too. I guess I am better suited to put up with those a couple of months a year than cold weather. Of course, summer here sucks but I love spring and fall here. Plus, this is where our families are from so I just cannot imagine ever living very far away.
LITC, YAY! A new Walter photo! He just keeps getting more handsome! Is he always so happy?
Toting those precious kiddos around is enough to give you a back ache.... but so worth it. I hope you don't ever get a serious back problem cause then they tell you not to lift anything remotely heavy. I am always thinking HELLO! I am a mother! Just how am I supposed to not do that? Thankfully my DD is beyond me being able to lift now but there are still so many things that moms have to do. Back aches are really very, very inconvenient!
Hi
DL55,
D&D and anyone else out there!
Got this one in my e-mail today. I thought I would share it with any of you who can relate to being electronically challenged like I am.... of course, I try not to relate to the senior citizen part.
Challenged Senior Citizen
I thought about the 30 year business I ran with 1,800 employees, all without a Blackberry
that played music, took videos, pictures and communicated with Facebook and Twitter.
I signed up under duress for Twitter and Facebook, so my seven kids, their spouses, 13
grandkids and 2 great grand kids could communicate with me in the modern way. I figured
I could handle something as simple as Twitter with only 140 characters of space.
That was before one of my grandkids hooked me up for Tweeter, Tweetree, Twhirl,
Twitterfon, Tweetie and Twittererific Tweetdeck, Twitpix and something that sends every
message to my cell phone and every other program within the texting world.
My phone was beeping every three minutes with the details of everything except the bowel
movements of the entire next generation. I am not ready to live like this. I keep my
cell phone in the garage in my golf bag.
The kids bought me a GPS for my last birthday because they say I get lost every now and
then going over to the grocery store or library. I keep that in a box under my tool
bench with the Blue tooth [Blue tooth but it's red] phone I am supposed to use when I
drive. I wore it once and was standing in line at Barnes and Noble talking to my wife as
everyone in the nearest 50 yards was glaring at me. Seems I have to take my hearing aid
out to use it and I got a little loud.
I mean the GPS looked pretty smart on my dash board, but the lady inside was the most
annoying, rudest person I had run into in a long time. Every 10 minutes, she would
sarcastically say, "Re-cal-cu-lating." You would think that she could be
nicer. It was like she could barely tolerate me. She would let go with a deep sigh and
then tell me to make a U-turn at the next light. Then when I would make a right turn
instead, it was not good.
When I get really lost now, I call my wife and tell her the name of the cross streets and
while she is starting to develop the same tone as Gypsy, the GPS lady, at least she loves
me (after 50+ years I certainly hope so).
To be perfectly frank, I am still trying to learn how to use the cordless phones in our
house. We have had them for 4 years, but I still haven't figured out how I can lose three
phones all at once and have to run around digging under chair cushions and checking
bathrooms and the dirty laundry baskets when the phone rings. It was a lot easier when
it was connected to a cord (for the kids out there reading this, yes, there used to be a
cord attached to the phone - and we only had one phone in the house! I won't even go
into "party lines" but older folks know what I'm talking about).
The world is just getting too complex for me. They even mess me up every time I go to the
grocery store. You would think they could settle on something themselves but this sudden
"Paper or Plastic?" every time I check out just knocks me for a loop. I bought
some of those cloth reusable bags to avoid looking confused but I never remember to take
them in with me. Now, I toss it back to them. When they ask me, "Paper or
Plastic?" I just say, "Doesn't matter to me. I am bi-sacksual."
Then it's their turn to stare at me with a blank look.