Hankies, There is a Need for Hankies!

Today I make a plea for the return of the handkerchief, especially for men.  I miss it.  I miss turning to my husband, in the middle of a tear jerker movie and whispering, "Dear, do you have a hankie?"  And he, with a flourish magically pulls one out of his pocket, snaps it open with a flip of his wrist and presents it to me just in time to stem the flow of the waterworks.  The Hanky denotes chivalry, making him my knight in shining armor, aiding a damsel in distress.
You just can't get the same feeling from a disposable soft tissue paper nose wipe.
I grew up with hankies  in my house.  My Dad's hankies were always very large white squares, that on occasion, would have his initial embroidered in one corner.  If I remember correctly, those were the extra special hankies that Dads always got for Christmas from their kids, it was either hankies in the box with the see-though lid (you got to see the initial ) or they got the annual ugly Christmas tie. 
The first thing I was ever taught to iron was my Dad's hanky.  Learning along the way that it probably is not a good idea to place your entire hand against the face of the iron to see if it was ready to go.  The hanky was the first thing I really learned to fold.  As a kid I never got tired of ironing them, stacking them, admiring my expertise as a hanky ironer.
I can understand how the hanky went out of fashion, and Kleenex, the hanky killer, came to rule the day, but it seems to me  that men no longer carry hankies, nor do they have a ready supply of Kleenex.
On a recent flight, there was a man who definitely was in the need of a hanky.  Throughout the trip, he continuously, loudly tried to snuff back the mucus that quite obviously was wanting desperately to escape his nasal passages.  Listening to that for more than 2 hours made me want to lean over and offer him  the shirt sleeve of the man seated next to me.  Hanky, it was quite obvious that the man needed a hanky! 
Kleenex has replaced the hanky, however, I have not met many men who carry small packages of Kleenex around with them.  So, every married man I know has becomme dependent on their wives' purses, which I must say, do seem to have a never ending supply of Kleenex, or whatever medicinal need is required.  I don't ever think anyone has asked a man, "Hey would you happen to have a couple of aspirins?"  Chances are if you ask a woman, not only would she have aspirin, should most likely would ask you if you would prefer Advil, or perhaps even Tylenol.
I am a proponent of the revival of the hanky.  Men should think of it as the opportunity to really score points with the ladies, and at the same time, be available when sniffling, sneezing, dripping, noses are disturbing every passenger on a flight.

Not Too Sure I Want the Must Haves

I was on line catching up with the daily news, and an ad popped up, and it showcased a shoe? a boot ? a goat's hoof ?(see pic) and it blatantly stated that it is a Must Have....in who's world?  The last thing on the face of the earth that I need is a stiletto heeled boot thing with elevated soles and some sort of animal fringe encircling my legs.  My fear would be that if I wore these things every male dog in my neighborhood would be coming to call to take a sniff of the new bitch in town.  This got me thinking about other Must Haves that I would rather do without.

• Tattoos - not a fan, especially not a fan of the latest, tattooing the eyelid to create a permanent eyeliner, in order to save precious time in the morning.  I'll keep the eyeliner pencil and get up 2 minutes earlier to avoid eyeliner tattoos.
• Mohawk haircuts on pre-schoolers, when did this begin? 
• Artificial nails of any kind.  I recently saw what the nail looks like once the acrylic nails were removed, and all I can say is one look at that....I'll settle for what I have.
• Normal, everyday not going out on the town shirts that show so much cleavage they make every woman look like a Hootchie Mama. Designers, raise the necklines, please.
• A pricey handbag.  When did purses start costing minimally $250?  I look at them and ask why?  I don't get it, and I don't get why colorful quilted fabric bags are all the rage as well. 
• Add a bead Charm bracelets.  New take on old concept, I prefer the original.
• Individual 100 calorie serving sizes of anything.  When did we get so lazy, or so dumb that we need to be told by manufacturers what 100 calories looks like?  And at double the price?
• Bacon mania.  I am not buying bacon flavored lip balm, or bacon cologne or a band-aid that looks like a strip of bacon.  Not doing it.
• Jewel embedded teeth.  There is no reason to do this, none!  Does not improve anyone's appearance and if you're mugged, most likely you will get punched in the  mouth for the tooth as well.
• Piercings.  I admit to having my ears pierced.  I even get it that people may prefer more than one hole in each ear, but noses, tongues, eyelids,ewwwwwwwwww...enough!
• And finally, Call Ahead Seating.  I have seen this sign beginning to make its appearance in restaurants:  WE are proud to now offer call ahead seating....I may be mistaken, but isn't that otherwise known as reservations?  In my opinion, call ahead seating is not a must have when you are grabbing a bite at Applebees.

When are Paint Chips really not Paint Chips

Color.   Color and dirt.  Color and dirt and water spots on a ceiling.  Yup, that's the impetus to do something about the family room.
I say that  it is time to do something about the family room, but in woman speak, it means:  "Husband, you need to get off of your derriere and fix this.
Of course, once you get the buy in, that is, he has agreed to paint, you actually have to get off of your butt and get to the paint store and find the color that you want your man to paint.  OK. Bonus, we have the ceiling paint. And cconveniently, it is tinted purple, which allows the painter to see what has been painted and what needs to be painted.  Aside from the ugly circles that have miraculously appeared after some wind driven storms, the ceiling is a joy to paint.  (although I have heard that stomach muscles as well as neck muscles were inconveniently stretched to their limits).
Wall color, not easy to pick.  We initially went to the hoity toity store, and paid $25 for sample containers, none of which matched the paint chips.  I got a lovely crayola orange, when in fact the chip said I should expect a subdued pumpkin hue......NOT!  I also got crayola yellow and a another delightful yellow, which would have been ideal if I had wanted to paint a non-descript bathroom with an emphasis on sunny.
Our next 2 colors looked really good as the colors of the month, however, they were very, very dark which in our North facing room equates to gloomy.
We opted for neutral.  AKA, boring.  No pizazz, just comfy.  We have decided that no matter how many HGTV episodes we watch, we really are non-trendy kind of folks.  Instead of the Pumpkin, or sunkist gold, we settled for Taupe.  Of course the paint company has given it an exotic name, BAJA, but we know the truth, it is just a bit greyer than the beige  that previously lined the walls.
Hey, it is clean, it smells better, and just one shade darker .....well that makes us au courant, right?

Praise to Those Who Serve

I believe that I am current with what is taking place in the world today, I read a daily newspaper, peruse the news on line and listen to Brian Williams each evening as he brings the NBC evening news into my house.  I know that we as a country are involved in a war in Iraq and in Afghanistan.  I know we need to fight terrorism.
Yes, I know this, but truthfully, because no one in my immediate family is involved, I am somewhat distant from the reality of the war.
Recently we went on vacation, and when returning home, we arrived early to the airport.  An airport that is used to transport service personnel to their next assignment.  As we waited for our flight, we witnessed the most heart wrenching good-byes that I have ever seen.
Family after family, saying their goodbyes.  One serviceman, dressed completely in combat fatigues, had a wife and 2 young daughters.  The family was there to see him off.  Off to Afghanistan, yet again.  When his flight was announced, he reached out to hug his daughters and wife for the last time and began to walk toward the door which led him to the plane.  I will never forget the haunting wail eminating from the tiniest of persons, one long continuous wail, Dadddddddddddddddddddy.  The youngest daughter ran after him, arms outreached, wanting him to stop and hold her.  He looked back at her, and at his wife, who nodded, the nod saying, go ahead, I will take care of this.  He smiled, nodded back and moved on.
The mother then went and picked the little girl up, held her close, tears streaming down both of their cheeks, reached for her other daughter, and with the greatest of dignity walked away from the flight and out of the airport.  It was only then that I noticed that she was pregnant.
We ask so much not only of the soldiers that serve this country, but also of the families they leave behind.
I know this scenario takes place every day, and we as a nation must never forget.  These young, patriotic men and women deserve our love, support and prayers.  And we need to make sure that their families are taken care of while they are serving.
That day, in the Savannah, GA airport, I saw first hand what sacrifice is all about.  I will never forget.

Bye Bye Stores

OK, I am sure that I have written about this before, but this is my declaration of retail.  From this day forward, I am shopping only in those stores that maintain continutity in sizing in all of their clothing lines.

I am sick and tired of shopping Macy's ( for example, it could also be Nordstrom's or JC Penney) and having to bring multiple pieces of the same item into the dressing room, because there is absolutely no regulation when it comes to sizing of women's clothing. So, depending on the brand/designer the clothing could be sized in such a way that a woman needs 2 sizes larger or 2 sizes smaller.
I have had enough!  I have found 2 stores, and one on-line store that when I try on/order my size it is always my size.
I am not rich, but I do have $ to spend on a wardrobe.  I am a career woman, I work in a professonal environment and I need to update/change my wardrobe frequently.  The $ are there, alas, the clothes that are offered are not. 

I hate to go shopping for clothes, because I never know what size I am.  I have weighed the same for 10 years, my measurements are the same plump middle aged woman measurements, but depending upon the designer, the store or where the item is made, my size changes, and I hate that!

I realize that I am no longer the size that I was in college, 3 kids and a hysterectomy certainly took care of that, but c'mon designers, I need to know what size I am, and stick with it! 

We have elections this year in the US, I want some senator/congressman from somewhere to have as part of his/her platform that they will introduce a bill to Congress that insists on the standardization of women's clothing!  Men can walk into any store, any time and ask for a suit, size 42, and no matter what store has it, the suit will fit.  Try doing that with a suit for a woman.  It took me 3 years to find a suit that actually fit!  I finally found a place that allowed me to buy the jacket in one size and the skirt in another.  And I am thankful that the designer recognized the fact, that women have bosoms. I can actually buttom the jacket to my new suit!  Hurray.

I understand that fashion designers are creative and have a vision for their clothing lines, but if real women can't wear them, where is the satisfaction?  Please standardize women's fasions, I want the joy of shopping all of the stores, not my designated 3.

Something Else to Worry about when Traveling

Has this ever happened to you? Just when you are about to leave on vacation, you suddenly hear about outrageous things happening to tourists. Plane hijackings, planes sitting on runways for hours on end and now everywhere you turn you are hearing about bed bugs.

We will be boarding a plane exactly one week from today to spend an enjoyable time at a resort. We have been looking forward to this for more than six months, and suddenly every news station is bombasting us with the fact that there is a bed bug epidemic in North America This does not sit well with me. I can tolerate the occasional spider, or an ant or two, but bed bugs....NOT.

These little creatures have invaded the classiest of hotels in New York, and have even been found infesting the fabric furniture in the esteemed Empire State Building.

Just typing about this makes me itchy.

I am hoping that the folks who transport these little critters do not care for the South or ocean front properties...and have kept to the more cosmopolitan areas. That is my hope. I have learned that the South has a critter known as NOSEEUMS, which make me itch something awful, and they have cockroaches which they try to pass off as June bugs, but I know the difference. I have come to terms with both of those, but sharing my bed with something other than my husband just makes me queasy.

Will I check the bedding of this somewhat posh resort as soon as I arrive? You can count on it.

When Fertilizer is Not so Good for Plants

I love my garden. I love everything about it. I love browsing nurseries looking for the perfect plant, seed or bulb. I love planting in the fall with the anticipation of seeing something spectacular sprout up in the Spring. And in the Spring I like moving the heavy pile of wet leaves deposited in the Fall, to discover that the perennials are still there, pale, sometimes yellow in color and struggling to make it through those leaves. Yup, I like just about everything about a garden, .....................except the bugs.

I have battled all sorts of bugs, but I think this year, I have the most revolting bug ever! When you see it, you are momentarily fooled into believing that it is a lady bug. That friendly, eat all the aphids off the roses, good for the garden bug. But it is not. Same color, no spots. And instead of being a helpful little creature, it has an unbelievable appetite, and its plant du jour is a lily, my beautiful, pricey oriental lilies. Starting at ground level, they munch the foliage about 2/3 of the way up the stalk, leaving about 1/3 of the leaves and the buds of the flowers. They need to have the foliage at the top of the plant, as they need to deposit a substantial dollop of poop into which they lay their eggs. The eggs hatch, eat the poop for nourishment and then hop on up to the buds for dessert, leaving just a sad, sad stalk.
I battled them last year, but this year they were way out of control, so I took my just sharpened sheers, and cut every single lily down to the soil. Just the thought of scraping off beetle poop to save my lilies totally creeped me out. So my solution, take away the food source, force the little bugs to go elsewhere.
I am hoping against hope that the lily bulbs in the ground, just go back to sleep, and awaken next year to a garden sans this shi**y little bug. I am going to miss all the brilliant colors that the different varieties brought to the garden especially colorful for the 4th of July, but there is no way I was going to scrape beetle poop from the leaves of all of the lilies that I have, if I get too verklempt, I am going to tell myself to suck and up and just go look at a photo from the non-poopy years!

Proof of Citizenship Card, Please

Immigration debate - seems to be a very hot topic these days with the Governor of Arizona giving the police the right to question citizenship.

I have an idea. When going to the Department of Motor Vehicles for a US Driver's License, I think you should be required to show proof of citizenship (SSN?), or proof that you are in this country legally.

Show the proof, get the license and have the DMV also issue (at the same time) a proof of citizenship card complete with a picture. Then we need to make it standard operating procedure for all police departments throughout the US that when pulling over a driver they need to ask for (1) driver's license, (2) registration and (3) proof of citizenship.

This would become SOP for all Americans; therefore, eliminating the response that the police are profiling.

I think if immigrants are in the US legally, there should be nothing to worry about, and if they are not, they should be worried. They should be deported, and then allowed to apply to enter this country legally as millions have done throughout our history. I want the USA to be a country that welcomes immigrants from throughout the world, it is what this country is all about....I just want everyone to play by the rules, and do it legally!

I was listening to the radio on the drive to work this morning, and heard a DJ ask the following, "If you had to eat only one food for an entire week, for breakfast, for lunch and for dinner, and including any snacks, what would it be?"

I had to think long and hard on this one.

I think that there are certain foods that are fine for lunch and supper but not for breakfast. And there are foods I like for breakfast, like oatmeal, but somehow it doesn't seem to fit well as an entree for supper.

Fish - good for lunch and dinner, a bit too strong for breakfast, I'm not a fan of the lox.

Desserts - After Thanksgiving I have been known to have a piece of pie with coffee in the morning, but I don't think I could eat it all day.

Fruit, possibly if I did not have to choose just one kind. Somehow I think that would be against the rules, and I don't think I could just eat apples or pears all day, every day for a week.

I think if I had to choose, I would choose a sandwich. Probably a turkey sandwich with cheese, lettuce and tomato and mayo. I'm trying to think healthy here. I would get a protein, veggies, dairy and the little bit of fat necessary to keep my skin oh so soft. I would want to make sure that the turkey was from a freshly roasted bird, not some deli, and I would insist on a really good Swiss cheese. Vine ripened tomatos would be a must, and I want just plain old head lettuce, not some uber special greens du jour.

On second thought, I might settle for pizza. I like onion and bacon pizza. Bacon is a breakfast food after all........but I'm thinking that it probably would not go great with coffee, though. I know it goes great with wine, and that's do-able for both lunch and dinner.

OK, I've made up my mind, it's a sandwich - maybe I could vary the breads....and still be playing by the rules.

What would you pick?

Not Cranky, Just Experienced

I am becoming more and more cantankerous as I get older, I am blaming it on less patience, but I do not think that is it. I think as we age, we recognize the BS more quickly. Life experiences somehow manage to embed themselves in your brain, and when you hear/see the same BS that you heard in your 30's or 40's, which you may have bought into, now your brain identifies it, analyzes it and labels it BS in a matter of seconds and without even thinking about it forces you to roll your eyes in a way that says, "Are you kidding me?"

So I have decided that I am not cranky, rather, I am just experienced. Things that make me roll my eyes.

• Anyone, (politicians, athletes,celebrities) who claim to have a sex addiction and need to go to rehab for the cure, didn't believe it when I first heard about it as a solution for Red Sox player, Wade Boggs, don't believe it now.


• Health care providers such as Blue Cross who send me colorful brochures telling me they care, they care only if they have to pay, they continually tell me how much $ is left for my lifetime care - when it's gone , it's gone. Yup, they care, sure!


• Beer commercials aimed directly at a young demographic, that add as an afterthought that you should drink responsibly. If that happened, sales would go down, I do not believe that care an iota whether or not you should drink responsibly, they just don't want to look like an irresponsible corporation.


• Any product that says within 30 days you can look like some tall, well toned, tanned, blond beauty, and continue to eat what you want and not exercise, just swallow the magic pill or drink a slimming shake. Right!


• I am skeptical when stores continually run 50% off sales. My instinct tells me that they raised the prices so they could then lower them by 50%, mark a tag and make people think that they are getting a bargain when in reality they are paying full price.


• Anything marked Lite. I am convinced that whatever they did to make it Lite, is going to be declared unhealthy in about 10 years.


• Any self help program that says that it can teach you how to be debt free, pay off your mortgage and get oodles of savings in the bank all within a year....sure!


• Any product that claims to be self cleaning - I have a self cleaning oven, that once it does its thing , I still need to wipe out the crud that is left behind.


• Stain resistant fabrics - I have managed to stain them all


• Auto insurance ads bug me, each one says it can save you more money than the other guy, yeah, if you buy a car and never drive it!


• And the uber expensive face creams that claim that they tighten the skin, firm the old neck wattle and take years off of your appearance, all for just $100/ounce....I'm beginning to get used to the wattle...gobble, gobble, gobble.

I am creature of habit,
During the work week I get up at the same time, I have a very regimented routine, and I leave the house to hit the roadways at exactly the same time each day. I have timed my departure so as to beat the school buses for the high school. It gets me to work very early, however, if I leave after the buses, I am late. I would rather be early. I take the exact same route every day. And each day I pass the same people. I have been doing this for 11 years. I pass the lady who walks her 2 beagles, I pass the 2 elderly walkers who also pick up trash along the way, and I pass a woman who has all the physical qualities that I envy. She is tall, slim and wears Bermuda shorts and a windbreaker as if she were a model in some golf periodical. Although I have never had a conversation with any of these folks, we have done the "head nod" thing. Which, in my mind is the equilvalent to actually meeting these folks.
Recently, I was out of the office for 10 days, and for the next 5 altered my routine. So in essence, it was a half of a month before I got back to my usual routine.
The first Monday that I was back on schedule, the first "regular" that I passed was the 2 dog lady ( in my mind I always equate her with 3 Dog Night and giggle a little every time I think of it) and she gave me a look that said, "Hope everything is alright". I waved. Universal acknowledgement for everything is copacetic. Next, I passed the walkers who actually put up their hands to indicate that I needed to stop. I pulled over to them, lowered the passenger side window, and they asked, "Everything, OK" ? My answer, "Just fine, see you tomorrow." They nodded, and I drove on.
My last encounter was with the woman who looked like a mature model for a golf magazine, she held up 2 fingers in a v for victory sign, which told me that she understood that something had happened, but she was glad to see me back.
Isn't life odd, although I have never had a conversation with any of the folks I just wrote about, all of them were glad to see me when I returned to my normal schedule.
And I was glad to see them, it meant that everything was back to normal, everything was as it should be, and it meant that caring folks exist everywhere, whether you realize it or not. I think I am beginning to realize it!

Choices

There are certain things in life that you cannot choose. You cannot choose your parents, and you cannot choose your in-laws and if you are a patient in a hospital, you do not get to choose who they put next to you in your room.

Life is an adventure, and recently my husband needed surgery, a very serious surgery, the kind that gives you the heebie-jeebies in your stomach. So to say the least, you are a bit on edge and you do not need anything to add to that stress....enter the roommate. I sat by the bedside of my husband for 10 days. 12 hours a day for 10 days. Within that time he had a total of 4 roommates. One died. Stressful to say the least, for me anyway, as hubby was still blissfully oblivious taking full advantage of better living through chemicals.

The next roommate was from Louisiana, and apparently a kingpin in some nefarious underworld organization. He had been flown to this hospital on a private plane, and with no scheduled appointment, demanded to be seen by the Neurosurgery team. He had an entourage of about 8 distinctive characters, who demanded that the nurses pay them patient respect. 2 of the nursing team refused to walk into the room, and security was called to prevent additional intimidation. He was only there about 48 hours, but it seemed like a lifetime to me. He was finally given the identical diagnosis from the team at this hospital as he was given by the Drs in Louisana, the old man suffered from ALS and it was not going to get better, in fact it was going to get worse and get worse at a rapid pace. As soon as he received the news, his entourage bundled him up, contacted the private plane and left. They did not check out, they did not check with anyone, they just picked up the old guy and left. I could hear the theme song to The Godfather playing ever so softly in my head.

The 3rd roommate was an unbelievably aware 92 year old man who just wanted to get home to make sure that his wife of 65 years was OK. She suffered from early stages of dementia and he wanted to make sure that she was all right. When it was determined that he was too weak to go home, the hospital staff made sure that he was sent to a re-hab facility where she could go with him. It makes me smile to think that they will still be in the same room after 65 years of marriage enduring a separation only through WWII, and neurosurgery.

The last roommate was a musician, who when driving suddenly lost his sight. Scary.

And like I said in the beginning, there are certain things in life that you do not get to choose. I did not choose for my husband to have a brain tumor, but it happened. And you deal with it. The levels of stress along the way seem to ebb and flow like a river. I will admit that the roommate dying, and the godfather episode truly added to the stress, but the endearing charm of the 92 year old pharmacist as he relayed his concern for his wife to the nurses released all that pent up stress. And the dulcet speaking voice of the musician was soothing as well.

Life, they say, is about choices. I think everyone should know that sometimes you do not get a choice, and when that happens, the only thing you do get to choose is how you will react.

Stress comes and goes like the tide, I have learned that you need to acknowledge when it is great and to celebate when it is nil. I am in celebration mode as we are back in our house, choosing to be slugs on a dreary overcast Sunday afternoon. No stress there.

Where are the copywriters and proofreaders?

I just received an e-mail from a company that wanted to do business with me. They put together a flashy e-newsletter complete with all the bells and whistles, and at I must admit that the flashiness of it made me give it a closer look.

And this is what the very first line of copy read:

Where the kind of company that delivers quality everytime.

I'm not kidding, that was the very first line of copy.............and it got better, a bit further down I came upon this gem

.....when theirs to much on your plate.....

So I wanted to see where this quality driven company was located, so I clicked on the link to their website and it brought me to the site of a take out restaurant. I went back and looked at the link, then googled the name of the company, and guess what? These geniuses actually published a wrong website address. I'm sure the take out place loves the extra traffic.

I work with truly gifted design firms, numerous ones in fact, however, when I get sent an eye catching piece of self promotion, I generally check it out.

This one was a quick delete, but only after I printed it out and saved it in my file. You can find it under the letter I in my file cabinet, it's in the folder called: I can't believe that somebody signed off on this and sent it out". I could have easily filed it in my other folder as well, the one filed under D for Do Not Ever Give Business to These Guys/

When Attacked - Fight Back

Last night, I was sitting quite comfortably in my ever so fluffy recliner with my feet up, sipping an adult beverage and enjoying the evening news, when quite suddenly the area around my right ankle began to itch. Not some minor "give it a little scratch" kind of itch, but more of a full blown "you better have long fingernails to get at this" kind of itch. I looked down after attacking the itch to discover its cause - a bug bite. And I immediately recognized the culprit responsible for this bite, a mosquito!

Those little critters leave their marks on me something awful. Their bites create a hard raised rounded lump of flesh that begs me to scratch it until blood comes to the surface. Trouble is, I never saw or heard the little buggar come near me; therefore I never had the opportunity to take a defensive swat before the bite. I reiterate, I was inside my own house, completing relaxing, minding my own business, looking forward to watching pre-season football, when out of nowhere I was assaulted by this critter. I searched the family room, saw nothing, heard nothing. Out of the corner of my eye, I thought I saw something on the wall in the hallway that leads to my bedroom, so I grabbed the latest issue of the LL Bean catalog, rolled it tightly and began to gingerly tiptoe toward the creature. I swatted the wall with such force that the knick-knacks that I have sitting on a shelf hanging on the same wall actually shook, I had a very smug look on my face until I double checked what I had just swatted - a dreaded piece of lint!

Not being able to find my attacker, I went back to the recliner and resumed sipping my adult beverage in its cold glass which I placed against my itchy ankle to see if I could bring relief, not so much, figured I most likely had a better chance of numbing it from the inside out, so I got up to get a refill, and that's when I spotted it.

The silent but deadly mosquito was happily flitting against the backsplash tile in my kitchen. With all of the blood it just sucked out of me, I would have thought its bloated belly would have slowed it down, but nope, there it was flitting away. This time I grabbed an issue of hubby's Numismatic News, a more substantial publication, tabloid size, which meant I could really smash my assailant. I saw it pause for a moment and I took my shot, and immediately sent the tall pepper grinder and a cruet filled with olive oil to the floor, spilling their contents - great! Cleaning up olive oil from ceramic kitchen tile and grout, not so much of a fun activity, and to add insult to injury, while I was on my hands and knees cleaning up the mess, I got bitten again, this time on the back of my upper left arm. So I say to myself, this is war. Meantime, my eagerly awaited NFL preseason game has started, and I have not even seen a play.

I couldn't find the sneaky blood sucker, so I took solace in getting my adult beverage, and walked back into the family room to watch the game and that' s when I spotted him. Just sitting, fat and happy on the side door - now I knew I had a clear shot at him. This time I took the time to get the blue plastic fly swatter that is always hanging close by, and I casually walked up to the door. I knew he sensed me coming and in his panic he began to fly upwards and I judged my swat just right. I smashed that annoying, biting, nasty pest and in doing so splattered my blood all over the beige painted door. By the way, I observed that I have very healthy looking deep red blood. I felt victorious! Of course, throughout the evening, the bites continued to besiege me with itchiness, which thank God, as I found out earlier in the evening, can be numbed by sipping an ever so delightful adult beverage.

Maybe it's time for a tax on toilet tissue

I live in the smallest state in the union, and currently we are experiencing a severe downturn in the economy. We have one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation, and from everything I am reading we are not exactly a business friendly state. There are about one million residents in this state, wouldn't you think that this would be the ideal place to put new and innovative ideas to work? How hard could it be?

I think this state reflects what is happening throughout this country. Everyone agrees that something must be done, but only if it does not affect them.

If we want to save money in this state and nationwide, I suggest we take a look at things from a business perspective. Consolidation of repetitive departments eliminates waste and gives the purchasing department more clout when trying to negotiate terms with vendors. I want to start with the department of education, both locally and nationwide.

I want every student in America using the same curriculum. A 1st grader in California should be learning the same thing as a 1st grader in Connecticut. They should be held to the same standards and they should be using the same textbooks. Same holds true for Jr high and Sr high school students. Can you imagine the money we can save if every school district in the country used the same materials? Any student could transfer throughout the nation and never miss a beat when it comes to school. And the cost savings would be phenomenal.

All school books should be printed in English only - that is the language of this country, thus we eliminate the need for secondary school books. All classes are taught in English, eliminating duplication of classes being taught in alternative languages. Private schools can teach however they would like, but if a school is supported by taxpayers, then English will prevail.

I believe in public pre-school and in full time kindergarten. I think it is needed. And I think the cost savings should be made by looking at materials and not looking to eliminate teachers. I do think that the age of pensions is past, and all municipal employees should now be enrolled in 401K plans and I think retirement age for municipal employees should be the same as for the rest of the population, 62. If municipal employees wish to retire earlier that's fine with me, just do not ask tax payers to provide for you until you reach 62. Gone are the days of putting in 20 years service and retiring at age 40. And, with the cost of healthcare going through the roof, I do not think that any retiree is entititled to healthcare for life, especially when the costs fall directly on the backs of taxpayers.

My mother was a very wise woman. Years ago when the national debt was outrageous she suggested that we place a nickel tax on toilet paper. One nickel. And all of that tax money would be spent on eliminating the national debt. She felt that every American, rich or poor, would be taxed the same on this issue. No getting around it, everyone needs toilet tissue, so both rich and poor would contribute. No one could use a tax loophole to avoid paying it. It would be just for all. It made sense to me when she said it almost 25 years ago, and it still makes sense today. Let's take that nickel tax and apply it to the one issue that needs the money the most, and once that is solvent, more on to the next.

I think we need to look at where the excesses exist, and pare them down. In a downturn, businesses address it immediately, I think every city and state should start doing the same. When the state government is the leading employer of a state, something is terribly wrong. Consolidation of duplicate town agencies within a state would definitely be the beginning of savings. Having students all on the same page, being evaluated on the same materials seems to me to be not only a cost savings measure but would make for a better and more equitable educational system. I love my state, and my town, but it is time for change. I applaud those who are trying, and I understand those who want it to stay the way it currently is. Change is hard, but we need to look at our children and ask ourselves why should they pay for the excesses of their parents?

Just my 2 Cents.