Category Archives: Senior Citizens

Shocking Police Reports – Small Town News

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If you’ve never moved from a large city to a small town, you might find this amusing. I, myself, had tears in my eyes from laughing so hard.

I relocated recently and now receive an itty-bitty weekly town newspaper. One of the regular columns is Cops Corner (a report of crimes committed during the previous week). The following is a woman’s account “word for word” of her encounter with an intruder.

Suspicious Incident. A woman advised that her house is for sale and she has been showing it to prospective buyers. An elderly man came to see the house. They shook hands as he was leaving and he kissed the top of her hand. She said he then hugged her and kissed her on the neck. The man attempted to kiss the woman on the lips, but she pushed him away and asked him to leave. The man told her he would like to make love to her. She never felt threatened but did tell him to leave several times. The man left without further contact. She is not pressing charges.

Is that a hoot, or what?! Here’s another one for your reading pleasure. Same week, same paper. A real crime spree!

Larceny – Motor Vehicle. A man informed a deputy that someone had broken and removed the passenger window of his truck. The victim showed the deputy the broken side window and said that after breaking the window, the unknown person placed it in the grass next to the vehicle. The man stated the GPS, satellite radio and his safety equipment were all still in the vehicle. The only things taken were (WAIT FOR IT!) a soda from his cooler and two AA batteries. There are no suspects.

It seemed to be quite a week for odd car break-ins. A 19-year-old woman stated that an unknown person broke into her Jeep, too. Stolen? three $1 bills and $2 in change.

Don’t you just love small town America? Meanwhile, the oil is gushing into the Gulf of Mexico like there’s no tomorrow.

Pensacola Beach After The BP Oil Spill

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Photo from

How sad! And the oil is still gushing. It’s like the Exxon Valdez all over again–only this time on a daily basis.

A lot of people and politicians are asking why the well can’t be blown up.

From Rep. Phil Gingrey

“For the life of me, I can’t understand why BP couldn’t go into the ocean floor, maybe 10 feet lateral to the — around the periphery — drill a few holes and put a little ammonium nitrate, some dynamite, in those holes and detonate that dynamite and seal that leak. And seal it permanently,” Rep. Phil Gingrey (Ga.) said earlier this month.

Could it be BP is more worried about their bottom line? Do you think they care nothing about people or nature?

Oh, forget I wrote that. No one could be that greedy.

Typewriter, Dictaphone, Mimeograph, Email, Laptop

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I bought my first laptop today.

It got me to thinking back to my first secretarial job. Back then the qualifications needed to land a job were a good typing score (on a typewriter) with a knowledge of shorthand, or the ability to transcribe from a dictaphone or ediphone.

If copies were ever needed, you used carbon paper. Suppose you needed fifty or sixty copies? Then you had to rev up the mimeograph machine, but first a stencil had to be typed. Lots of good fun there!  See Boomer with a View.

I remember the first time I used Email. The system was installed into every employees’ computer in the company. Voila! I could actually send a message to someone on the third floor from the first floor. Believe it or not, it was only a test run at our company. The CEO didn’t see any future in it. When the test period ended, Email disappeared from my workplace. Wonder where that guy is working today?

Anyway, I wrote this post on my new laptop. Welcome to the 21st century.

Dieting & Disco Dancing

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How many times have you heard this? “If you want to lose weight, you must diet and exercise.” That sentence is at the top of my list of most hated things I want to hear.

I applaud all the people who love to jog, or love to go to the gym. I’m not one of them. However, I do like to listen to music, which brings me to disco dancing. Have you ever noticed how hard it is to sit and listen to disco music. That’s because it’s main appeal is it’s hard-to-ignore invitation to dance. The beat is perfect.

Therein lies the key that unlocks my exercise room. In my case, that’s my living room. I’ve been disco dancing (when no one is around). It’s fun. Finally! An exercise I can love.

You don’t need a partner, so let the gyrating begin.

Bowling – The Pin Boy

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photo from

Well, it’s official. I’m really, really old! Yesterday I had to explain what a pin boy was. This “back in the day” knowledge of mine rushes in and sometimes startles me. I can’t believe how much the world has changed since I entered it.

Anyway, for those who lack my firsthand knowledge–The pin boy’s job was to set the bowling pins up after they’d been knocked down. Each boy covered four or five lanes and on a busy night, you sometimes had to wait for him to reset your lane. He was also in charge of clearing downed pins if they tipped over and stayed in the playing field.

There were no electric contraptions coming down to pick up and swish the pins backward. Everything was done by muscle. Oh, and the pin boy had to place the bowling ball in the chute to return it to the player, too.

It may not sound like it, but being a pin boy was a pretty good job. Several kids I knew held the job and loved it, except for the times they got hit in the ankle by a flying pin or bowling ball. But they had elevated steps to stand on located between the lanes, so an experienced pin boy hardly ever got hit unless he was caught off-guard moving from one lane to another. Then the players would hear him scream, “ouch.”

Jeez. Now that I think about it,  I can remember when the guts of a computer took up an entire room…but that’s another “back in the day” story.

Dr. Who – New Who – Who Knew?

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Photo from telegraph.co.uk

Just thought I’d take a trip down memory lane. I’ve been watching “The Doctor” take off on new adventures in the Tardis since the 70’s. Back then Tom Baker was the Time Lord. His scarf was a bit off the wall, but it matched his personality.

For the last couple of years I enjoyed David Tennant, a totally different type of Doctor, but still endearing. Now he’s gone. He has regenerated into a new Dr. Who.

telegraph.co.uk

Meet the new Dr. Who – Matt Smith. Who knew a TV series could go on this long! Believe it or not, Matt’s the 11th Doctor. He brings something new to the role, but he’s still Dr. Who, the smartest Time Traveler in the Universe.

“New Tricks”- Is Anyone Watching?

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New Tricks — Am I the only one who has discovered this BBC weekly series?

New Tricks

Photo from TV Page.com

Look for it on Monday nights. In my area, PBS airs back to back one-hour episodes starting at 8:00 p.m. (no commercials – hooray!)

TV.com writes a short summary.

New Tricks centres around Sandra Pullman who out of desperation to put her flagging police career back on track recruits three old veterans to lend a helping hand.

The show proves, conclusively, that you can’t teach old dogs new tricks!

Lentil Barley Soup – The Best

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3 cans Vegetable Broth
3 cans Beef Broth
1 cup lentils
1 cup barley
1/2 cup dry black eyed peas OR dry kidney beans
3 tblspn olive oil
1 lb (2 cups) Italian sausage OR Italian turkey sausage
1 large onion, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
2 large carrots, chopped
2 large cloves garlic, chopped very fine
1 tblspn fresh basil (use dried if you must, but add only 1 tsp.)
1 tblspn fresh parsley (use dried if you must, but add only 1 tsp.)
1/2 tblspn powdered thyme
3/4 tblspn dried oregano
1 tsp pepper
1 – 8 oz can stewed tomatoes OR Italian cubed tomatoes
Optional Ingredients:
1 can beans, drained (northern, kidney OR cannelloni, your choice)
brown or white rice
1 can mixed vegetables
pastina
bouillon cubes (with water)

  • Pour all broth into a large pot
  • Add lentils, barley and dry beans. Simmer for 1/2 hour.
  • In separate pan, brown sausage on all sides in olive oil. Drain off oil, if necessary. After sausage is cooked, cut into bite-size pieces. Add to soup.
  • Chop celery, carrots, garlic and onion. Add to pot.
  • Add all seasonings and the can of tomatoes to pot.
  • Cook on low for 1 1/2 hours.
  • About the Optionals – I usually serve this soup as the main course (with French or Italian bread) so I like it to have a lot of body. I often add some OR all of the Optional Ingredients.
  • NOTE: If you decide to add rice or pastina, you must add another 3 or 4 cups of water along with a bouillon cube for each cup of water.

As with most homemade soups, the longer it cooks, the better it gets. I have put this soup all together in the morning and left it cook on low until dinner. Excellent! Remember to check it from time to time, though.

This makes a huge amount of soup, but it freezes well. I put it into freezer containers holding 3 or 4 servings each. Believe it or not, it comes out of the freezer better than when it went in, if that’s possible.

Enjoy. It’s worth the trouble and one pot will feed a family several times.

6 Easy Diet Snacks

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I’ve already demonstrated how to cook perfect hard-boiled eggs in my previous post, and they are the first items on my snack list, as well as on Heidi Klum’s.

  1. 2 Hard-boiled Eggs (only 150 calories)
  2. Eat your favorite cereal straight from the box. No milk? More cereal!
  3. Look for The Laughing Cow light cheese spread triangles in the dairy case. 1 triangle = 35 calories. (I can vouch for the Swiss flavor–it doesn’t taste like artificial muck!) 1 triangle easily covers 6 or 7 saltine crackers.
  4. Rice Cake smeared with 1/2 tablespoon peanut butter and 1/2  sliced banana
  5. Low-fat Cottage Cheese with plenty of fresh blueberries mixed in
  6. Listen up! There are 15 calories in a tablespoon of ReddiWip. Think about that. You can add some really good zippitydoodah to that blah jello. Live a little. Spritz on two whole tablespoons. I’m not talking about that fat free stuff, either. This is the real deal. Jello with fruit with a large dollop of whipped cream. Heaven help us!

Helpful Hints You Probably Already Know:

  • Don’t drink your calories.
  • Stay away from sweets.
  • Eat every morsel of food s-l-o-w-l-y.
  • Be realistic. If you lose one pound in a week, that’s “great.” If you lose 1/2 pound in a week, that’s “very, very good.”
  • Homemade vegetable soup is your friend. It’s easy to make. Empty a large can of chicken broth into a pot. Put every imaginable vegetable you have handy (fresh or frozen) into the broth. Cook over medium heat for at least an hour. Separate into 2-cup containers (or larger, if you want – there’s no limit to the amount you can eat). Then keep the containers handy in the frig and freezer.
  • I’m not even going to mention exercise, because that’s such a pain in the butt. But remember, if you walk down every aisle in the supermarket, or you shop at the mall. Hey, you’re walking–Excellent!
  • Most Important – Don’t beat yourself up. If you hate broiled scallops, but love fried scallops, what the heck. Order them, but fill the rest of your plate with veggies. Also start you meal with a salad. And stick with the cocktail sauce, not the tartar sauce. There you are–no guilty conscience at all.

Maine

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Acadia National Park

I’ve never been to Maine, but I’d like to go someday. Here are some of the places I’ll be looking for:

Presque Isle is the starting point for the world’s largest scale model of the solar system, which runs along U.S. Rt. 1 to the town of Houlton, 40 miles away. The center of the solar system is the University of Maine at Presque Isle. The town rests on the eastern edge of the great North Woods, so it is the ideal home base for those who come to Maine to snowmobile, hunt, fish, hike, or mountain bike.

Bar Harbor is adjacent to Acadia National Park, home to 1,532-foot Mount Cadillac. Its summit is the first spot in the United States where the sunrise can be seen.

Other things you’ll find in Bar Harbor: 125 miles of hiking trails, brewery tours, rock climbing, sailing, boat excursions and golf.

Portland, located on Casco Bay, is Maine’s largest city as well as its creative hub. Many craftspeople, artists, and other creative types have chosen to live and work here.

I’m going to take the ferry over to Nova Scotia, and go up in a hot air balloon. And if you like deep-sea fishing, this is the place to go.

Naples is packed with antique shops, restaurants, art galleries, gift shops and two miniature golf courses. It is also the place to rent boats, kayaks or jet skis, buy a ticket for a sea plane ride, or catch a ride on a 300-passenger replica of a Mississippi River stern paddle wheeler. For evening entertainment, establishments on the Causeway offer live music, and the nearby Bridgton Drive-In shows first-run movies on two screens under the stars.

This is only a small sampling. There’s Bangor, Kennebunk, Bath, Rockport, Cape Elizabeth, and Stonington.

Oh, did I mention the food? Zowee!