NO THANK YOU, BLACK FRIDAY

It’s still Thanksgiving morning; my bulging newspaper was stuffed with catalogs and sale flyers. Without even browsing, I separated and carried all those ads straight to the recycle bin.

That notorious and much heralded day of shopping will soon be upon us.

I don't do Black Friday, period! Normally, I enjoy shopping. But crowds, noise, confusion, and stress I do NOT need. Besides, there's 365 days a year to buy gifts! Why wait until the holiday season? There are sales year round! Holidays should be fun, not stressful!

Unbelievably, stores are now open on Thanksgiving Day! I find that obscene. It's greed run amok!

Normally, I love to shop! Among my talents, I have a knack for finding cool things that others overlook. Many times, people have stopped to point inside my basket and inquire where I found a particular item, or else someone in the line behind would tap me. More than once, a check-out clerk has picked up my item and exclaimed, “I didn’t know we sold this! Where did you find it?” This has happened to me in other countries as well.

Friends and even enemies used to say that I could go into a Thrift Shop and come out looking like a million bucks! Believe me; I’m in my element in ANY store. However, I prefer my shopping excursions to be without pressure and no one’s elbow in my back. Besides, I buy few gifts now. Plus I don’t need any more stuff.

My Black Fridays are spent erecting & decorating my Christmas tree. Since my tree is tall & wide, it’s an all day job! Not to mention a hazardous one for someone who is no longer young. My entire body aches the following day. However, it’s well worth the trouble.

Standing beneath this gorgeous creation of artificial fern, brightly colored lights, & gaudy decorations, I am uplifted. I embrace this feeling. I only wish the holiday season could last forever.

My big, garish tree is just for me to enjoy. And enjoy it, I do! The day after Thanksgiving for me, is filled with color.

GETTING ANTSY

Besides ugly mold upon my roof and driveway, the summer storms drove the ants inside my walls. By autumn, they were invading the inside of my home. The day prior to last Thanksgiving, sugar ants were everywhere in my kitchen! Thanks to a cold front the night before, they were gone Thanksgiving morning. My holiday was saved!

A few weeks back, I returned from lunch with a friend. The first thing I did was to slip off my shoes before getting a drink of water. As I stood over the sink, my feet and ankles began stinging with pain. Red ants were all over my kitchen floor!

That morning thanks to the Florida humidity, my International Coffee had hardened into a rock! I used a knife where a jackhammer was required. Flavored coffee powder was flying everywhere! I thought I’d cleaned it all up, apparently not! Hey, this was around 5:30 AM everything was dark!

In the bright light of afternoon, I could see the red invasion! I did not want to spray RAID around my kitchen and pantry. In my garage was a powder guaranteed to kill them. It cautioned against using around pets & children. Since I have neither, I thought I was safe. I covered my floor with the stuff & went upstairs to change my clothes and program my DVR, etc.

After about an hour, I was ready to vacuum. Perhaps it’s because my vacuum was old, (I empty after each use, honest!) instead of sucking up the powder, it was blown up into the air to form a white atomic-looking cloud spreading poison throughout my house. Quickly I dropped the handle and dashed upstairs 3 steps at a time instead of 2! -- I didn’t want that stuff in my lungs!

After reading the entire newspaper from cover-to-cover, I determined it was safe to come back down. I swept up all the poison powder, and then mopped my floor with bleach.

Since then, several people have told me I should have used baking  powder & vinegar for ants & clean-up because they are less hazardous. As a history buff, that reminds me of the final days of WWII. Hitler armed children & old men to defend the homeland; this is vinegar & baking powder. To really get the job done right, you need bleach & insecticide! They are like the U.S. Marines storming the beach at Normandy. Sure, there’s a chance you’ll get hit by friendly fire, but that’s just collateral damage.

The following day, I bought a new vacuum cleaner. It was light-weight, just as my previous one. I don’t like lugging anything heavy up my staircase. Unlike my previous one, this one required assembly!

I am about as skilled at assembling things as I am at programming a computer, which is not at all! Others tell me this is precisely why I need a husband. In other words, I should make 2 people unhappy just so I can have a free handyman.

I ended up putting it in my spare room with the half-assembled fan I bought 2 summers ago.

Anytime you see a solitary ant, crush it! This is a scout, the little Flint McCullough of ants. (If you grew up during the Golden Age of Westerns as I did, you know who he is.) If the little ant McCullough doesn’t return, the settlers will stay away.

Ant-wise, I’m all prepared for this Thanksgiving! I’ve thoroughly cleaned my counter tops and pantry. Plus I’m armed with bait traps, talc, and boric acid. Also cheap Dollar Store perfume works in a pinch if I want to drown them. -- Cough!

BEHOLD MY PERLIOUS MOLD

Seems like every single afternoon throughout the last summer it stormed around 2:00 PM. And I mean booming thunder, lightning, & heavy rains! This was hardly the sunshine state.

Come autumn, the result was ugly mold coating my roof and driveway. Naively, I didn’t expect problems in hiring someone to pressure clean it. The last time was in 2010. My (then) neighbor informed me they had hired someone and I needed it done, too. “You won’t find anyone cheaper or better,” she said. – Well, I wish I had saved the guy’s phone number!

Several business cards were left on my door. Also I called numbers in the yellow pages. Nine out of ten times, I reached an answering machine. A week passed before I heard from most!

The 1^st to come and give me an estimate stated that he’d done my home back in 2003 and he didn’t want the job again! My steep-pitched 2-story roof was too dangerous. I heard this repeatedly! The few willing to do the job wanted about three times as much as I’d paid in 2010!

When I complained about the price, I was informed that all sorts of special safety equipment were required. -- The man who cleaned my roof in 2010 never set foot up there at all!!! He stayed on the ground the entire time. He just aimed his pressure cleaner up there and the mold came off like magic! These guys were handing me a load of B.S.!!!

After the double hurricanes of 2004, I remember all the professional roofers who refused to climb up there without safety equipment to give me an estimate. I also remember the Insurance adjuster who climbed up attired in his starched shirt & slacks, tie, & street shoes. He was agile as a mountain goat and made the guys in jeans, T-shirts, & sneakers look like wimps!

I asked why they couldn’t just get an 8 foot ladder, climb up three quarters of the way and avoid setting foot on the roof altogether. “Oh we can’t do a good job that way,” I was told.

“Good-bye!” I replied. I’m a single woman on a fixed income. People try to take advantage of me all the time.

Along the way, I asked a friend for advice, a lady who is business savvy and way smarter than I am. “Contact your Insurance Co.,” she said. “They might pay for it.”

I was flabbergasted hearing this! She is a good person and I know she meant well, but after weathering 6 hurricanes (3 alone) numerous northeasters and tropical storms, I knew instantly this was TERRIBLE advice!!! Unless there is catastrophic damage to your home, NEVER contact them! This results in a red mark by your name followed by a significant rise in rates.

My options were now growing ever more limited. I turned to the Service Directory of the local newspaper. In the past, I’d been warned never to hire workers from there. However my best and most reliable handyman I found there. Also this is where I got my Tech guy Jake, who was a gem. I miss them both!

Two pressure cleaners were listed. I called each for an estimate. One phoned from the road in front of my house, he never once got out of his truck! He informed me he didn’t want the job, because my roof looked way too hazardous.

The 2^nd was an older man (my age) who was listed under AAAAAA Affordable Pressure Cleaning. I explained about the previous cleaner in 2010. He nodded and said he could figure how the guy did it. He was hired!

All of the ugly mold is gone now! He did a perfect job! Plus it was performed at a price I could afford. And he never once set foot on my roof!!!

BEAUTY OF PLASTIC: FANTASTIC OR DRASTIC

Every time I hear someone say, “I’m proud of my wrinkles, I earned them!” I’m tempted to reply, “Egads, you must have done horrible, wicked things!”  

I see no virtue in aging gracefully. People should be ashamed for allowing themselves to fall apart!

An acquaintance, a delightful lady my age, recently had work done. It was quite obvious. But I didn’t know whether or not to say anything. Honestly, the before wasn’t bad. I didn’t see as she had reached the point yet where work was needed. However she looks great and you can’t argue with results!

Back when I turned 60, people didn’t hesitate to ask, “What have you had done?”

Hey, I’m poor; I can’t afford any of that stuff! Fortunately, clean living is still mostly working for me. People who smoke, drink, or do drugs age in dog years, just look around!

However, Old Man Time like The Grim Reaper can only be fended off for so long.

The only thing I have against plastic surgery is that it’s too darn expensive! If I had the money, you’d better believe I’d be hauling it over and getting cut, hoisted, sucked, & tucked as needed.

As for Botox, I’m leery of that. Any time you paralyze a muscle it’s going to atrophy. Just look at the legs of people who’ve spent years in a wheelchair. And Botox is injected into the face! We don’t know the long term effects, yet. However, when I turn 70 I’m not going to be worried about long term effects!

Back in the early 1990’s, ENTERTAINMENT TONIGHT featured the PETTICOAT JUNCTION actresses. They were attired in the exact clothing from the show and still sported the same hairstyles. However, their faces were that of old hags, it almost made my flesh crawl and my hair stand on end. It was downright creepy-surreal! These were actually attractive women, once! You know darn well they were probably getting whopping residuals from that show. You’d think they could spend a little on some cosmetic surgery, now and then. Usually, women who eschew this never had any looks worth hanging onto in the first place.

After seeing the photos, I’m really disappointed in you, Renee Zellweger! I’m sure you have been welcomed with open arms into the frump-a-dump brigade. Online, some are saying this is the result of plastic surgery gone wrong. Hot cat pee! Why didn’t she sue that doctor into the dirt! If that’s the result of a healthy lifestyle (as she claims) I’m helping myself to a chocolate éclair and cola right now!

True, undergoing cosmetic surgery involves risk, its SURGERY after all! The results are only as good as the doctor performing the procedure.

Back in 1996 a family friend spent $15,000 on surgery to her face and body right after she turned 75. Shortly after, the new and improved “Cora” came for a visit. Well, she looked scarcely different from the year before.

Cora admitted to being disappointed. Plus $15,000 was a lot more money back then! Among other things, she had her ample breasts hoisted, since they had fallen nearly down to her navel. After the procedure they were uneven and misshapen. – We took her word for it, she didn’t show us!

Cora returned to the surgeon and complained. “So you’re telling me I don’t know how to do my job!” was his reaction.

I asked if she made inquires with the BBB about the doctor. She shook her head. He was just someone she had selected from the yellow pages. I urged her to file a complaint against him.

Everything in life has risks; you just have to do whatever’s available to protect yourself.

Of course when it comes to personal enhancement, you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t! Back during the BAYWATCH years a guest on a local TV talk show made derogatory remarks about Pamela Anderson, saying her tan and other parts of her were phony! I’ve heard many other actresses referred to as plastic looking as well. These critics are overlooking something here. They fail to realize that in Hollywood looks are your livelihood! – Personally, I don’t go to movies to see ordinary, I want glamour!

Also your appearance is part of your identity!!!  

Many claim that plastic surgery won’t change your life. I disagree! If you feel happier looking into the mirror, that’s changing your life right there! My expensive dental work changed mine tremendously! I smile and wink at my reflection all the time. There was time I would NEVER smile, period! I have way more confidence now, too.

My friend Margaret once told me that other women don’t care about their looks as much as the two of us. “We should be glad,” she said. “It means less competition.”

I’m asexual and I don’t consider myself in competition with other women. I derive pleasure from anything that is appealing to the eye. I want to see MORE beautiful women around!!! It astounds me that most people maintain their homes better than their appearance. I say, keep America beautiful in every possible way!