There is a private camp ground in front of our house. The owner of it usually comes up during the holiday seasons like blueberry festival, fishing season opener, deer hunting opener, labor day weekend and such. It is not a big camp ground but it has Picnic Tables, Park Benches and even Adirondack chairs to recline on. They really make use of them, especially when they have a lot of friends coming up.

The camp ground doesn’t have playground equipment for the kids even though there are some that come up occasionally. There is a park nearby and a couple of lakes so there is plenty for them to do despite the lack of playground equipment.

Now that my hubby is retired, he has been reflecting back over his career as an engineer and been amazed by the kinds of changes that new technology has brought about in his life time. When he started into engineering, he was using a slide rule and drawing board to convey his ideas and designs. First it was the handheld calculator, then came computers, works stations and CAD-CAM software. At first only the big companies were able to afford these innovations but it was not long before the prices of computers and software came down dramatically. The increase in efficiency and productivity that were achieved by these technologies were absolutely mind boggling. These days kids have no idea what it was like before the days of computers, cellphones, ipods, barcode scanners, gps’s, etc, and ad nauseam. My hubby even remembers what it was like before they had a TV. Boy, is he old or what?

We have some friends who keep talking about selling their place, packing their RV and hitting the road. That sounds like it would be a really fun thing to do right off hand but I don’t know if they are really the type who could handle it in the long run. They currently do a lot of gardening and have a few farm animals to get them by since they are on a modest retirement income. I think that the gypsy life they are yearning for might be a little harder on the budget than what they think. RV’s use a lot of gasoline and when you add in rv insurance, maintenance, fees and such, it might turn out to be more expensive than they are thinking.

When I lived in the Philippines, both I and my younger sisters never had any problems keeping our weight down and having nice slim and trim figures. I came to the US five years ago and immediately began to gain weight. I went from 85 lbs when I got here all the way to 110 lbs. My younger sister came to the US two years ago and also began to gain weight quickly. After she got pregnant she went from 90 lbs to 160 lbs. I don’t know what she weighs now, after she had the baby, but I am sure it is a lot more than 90 lbs. On the other hand, my sister who went to Germany also got pregnant but never put on an unusual amount of weight and quickly got back down to her pre-pregnant figure and weight. My hubby has told me all along that he thinks the food manufacturers here in the US deliberately add ingredients to make us eat more and gain weight.

I have tried many different approaches to losing weight since I got here but have had only a little success. I tried diets at first but just kept gaining. Recently, I tried an exercise program that helped me lose weight but I injured my back doing it and now I am back to starting all over again. I am now thinking about trying ephedra diet pills to help me stay slim and trim.

Sometimes it seems like the politicians in this country are all going crazy. Now in the face of one of the worst economic downturns in the history of the country, they are bickering over the most trivial stuff rather than finding a real solution. Some say that Tax Cuts Increase Revenue to the government. Does that make sense to you? Think about the Bush tax cuts & the deficit we have now. I think that Obama and the Stimulus Package will help some but the question is will it help enough?

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I don’t know what the difference is between a promise ring and a wedding or engagement ring. I guess a promise ring stands for keeping your word or relationship to someone you love. I keep hearing about it but have never heard a clear definition of what a promise ring is. Unfortunately, I never had one but I do have wedding and engagement rings. If you are someone like me who needs some promise ring information, feel free to check out the linked website. There you can find anything related to promise rings such as tips, tricks, etiquette and more.

My hubby and I are now seriously considering dropping our current phone, internet and satellite TV providers. More and more they are getting to be a pain in the butt to deal with. We have a lot of problems with phone calls, internet and satellite TV. We have been dealing with these problems for months if not years.

On top of that, our satellite TV provider tried to charge us $95 for a service that they said would be free. They probably thought that they would get away with that because it was mixed in with several other bills. Maybe they could with other people but not in our house. My hubby and I always check the charges on our utility bills. We have caught and disputed quite a few over the years.

We are planning to get a fiber optic cable connection this time. We hope that we will have an improvement in our phone, internet and TV as a result. My hubby has already filled out the application forms and they are now ready to be sent in after we make sure we get the $95 back.