calculating

Good morning.
Well, no road trip yesterday, but we did get out of the house. :-)
My brother Bruce and his friend Tammy, were on their way back from Ann Arbor to Grand Rapids and stopped in Lansing for lunch and a little visit. We went to Bennigans, had a late lunch and a nice chat. It was good to see him and catch up. I don't see my brothers very often. None of us seem to make much of an effort. Must be a guy thing. :-)
Back at home I played on the puter. I calculated the miles of all our trips we have planned so far. With gas on a steady rise, I wanted to get a clue on how much the trips might cost us. I estimated 7mpg for the mo-ho,(we usually get between 6.5 and 8, depending on wind and terrain) and $4.00 a gal for gas. Which might be on the low side after reading this morning news. :-(
But anyway, right now, we've got enough in our gas fund to cover our 9 trips plus a little extra so far. :-) That was good news for Craig. A lot of our trips aren't too far from Lansing. And right now, our farthest trip is to the KOA near Union, Illinois. About 280 miles.
Then for dinner, Craig made those tasty spicy sweet pork cutlets with broiled asparagus.
And with the temps this week near forty and rain predicted, I'm hoping the snow finally goes away.

it was a good day

Good morning.
I made it to Muskegon and back with no issues.
I arrived around 9:30 and visited with my sister and Mom. For lunch, Mom wanted Chinese so we headed out to the House of Chan. A Chinese restaurant that's been there for years. Well, we discovered it was closed on Mondays, and Mom didn't want to deal with all the traffic around the mall, (and I don't know why cause I was doing the driving) so we headed over to Applebee's. As we approached Applebee's we went past a place called the Red Wok. I said "there's a Chinese place, do you want to go there?" Mom decided to try it. It was, of course, was a buffet. Now I don't do buffets but Mom wanted Chinese so I was stuck. But I actually liked it! They had a huge selection of food and I love Chinese food, so I filled my plate twice! The place was clean and the food was well tended to by the staff.
After lunch, we of course went to the club for drinks and pull tabs.
A couple hours later, it was time to take Mom home and head to Grand Rapids to drop Linda off at the airport for her trip back to North Carolina. It was good to see her after so many years, and she enjoyed her time with Mom.
Craig had a busy day while I was gone. He said he got up at 9 which surprised me, went to the bank, the pond store for more Algefix, and grocery shopping. Came home, did more laundry and mowed the yard. Fixed Hamburger Helper for dinner, but used sliced sirloin instead of hamburger, and also added peppers from the garden.
It was a good day.

My sister in law post

Okay, here's the pics of of me and my sister in law Lori in my Salon.

She use to spend $80 for a haircut and color in Grand Rapids. I told her I could send her the color for a fraction of the price and she could do it herself. But with Lansing only about an hours drive, she thought it'd be fun to come here and have me do it, and I agreed!

Lori is the wife of my youngest brother Bruce. The only sibling with a college degree. He is one smart cookie! And since we never seem to find time to get together, it's nice to see Lori and catch up on things. And she's fun to do. Always wants to try new stuff with her hair cut and color.
And she had me sit in the chair so she could 'hide' behind me. She thinks pics make her look fat. Umm Lori, there's a mirror right behind you. hehehe, no place to hide! But seriously, these pics make 'me' look fat! The way my shirt billows over my pants. But who cares? I don't. hehehe

busy week so far

It's been another busy week at the Salon. And on Thursday, my brother Bruce and his wife Lori, drove over from the Grand Rapids area. (about an hour west of Lansing) Lori had e-mailed me for a little hair care advice. When I found out how much she was spending on getting her hair cut and colored, I told her I could get her the stuff to do herself and save a bundle! So she came to the Salon, and we looked over the color swatches and decided to color it then ,so she could get a better idea of what shade she might like. And while I was at it, I also gave her a trim. She seemed really pleased with the results, and I sent them home with some supplies to get her through the holidays. It was fun to see them. I was hoping to do lunch with them also, but ran out of time.
On Friday evening after work we were invited to a holiday party at the Harem , a fairly new nightclub in downtown Lansing. Since we don't go out much, we thought it would be fun. (or at least I did. Getting Craig to go out is like pulling teeth!)
They advertise themselves as an 'urban lounge'. It was very nice with the exposed brick and lots of wood and iron. Here's a few pics I got from their website. Was going to take my camera, but thought that would be tacky.




It was a great party! Free drinks and delicious appetizers! And even though Craig felt totally out of his element, I think he enjoyed it too.
Well, then I wake up this morning and remember it's only Saturday, and I've got to go to work. Ugh! Oh well, just one more day, and then my 3 day weekend. Yaa!

the birthday girl

Just a quick post. had a nice time in Muskegon visiting my Mom. Wed. is her 75th birthday! Took her out to lunch and to her club(VFW). Here's a pic of the birthday girl!

Now I'm off to take my truck to the dealer for a brake issue. I'll tell you about that later....

Craig's test results

First, I want to say Craig is going to be okay.
I haven't posted earlier, because I was scared.
When we got home from the hospital, I got a chance to really look at the pictures of the polyps. One of the polyps looked a lot different from the rest. Most were smooth rounded balloon like thingys, but one looked knobby and hard.
I thought, "this doesn't look good".
Craig didn't look at the pics the whole week. On Sunday, he stumbled on them under a pile of papers. I think he didn't want to see them. His first words were, "this one doesn't look good".
I responded that it could be the angle of the camera, or the lighting, and reminded him that they were quite small, and the doctor said they were probably benign.
I could tell he wasn't convinced. We didn't talk about it after that. So, I didn't post because I didn't know what to say.
But today the surgeon called. He had 3 polyps that are pre-Cancerous.
That means, they not Cancer, but not normal either.
Which means he's lucky to have been checked when he did!
He's okay, but will need to be checked again in 3 years.
And like I've said to you all.............

If your over 50, get checked

That was stupid!

I tell ya, I'm dangerous! But only to myself!
More on that in a minute.
Sunday, I went to Muskegon to see my Mom. Her birthday is this month. She always has a little list of things she wants me to do. She lost her internet, some file got corrupted, so I reinstalled the software for that, cut her hair, then took her out to Red Lobster, for lunch. Yummy as always! Of course I had the Salmon New Orleans, and Mom had the Blackened Catfish and a Strip Sirloin Steak. Then it was over to the VFW, for cocktails and pull tabs. It was a nice day.

Monday, I stocked the motor home for our next trip, and got the car caddy hooked up to save us time on Saturday, as we are leaving right after work.


Also I decide to try and get rid of the rabbits in the yard.
First some history.
Our back yard is surrounded with evergreens.
And woven thru those is a 3 ft. high fence of chicken wire.
This is to keep the rabbits out, mainly in the winter,
because they'll eat bushes down to the ground.
We got a rabbit in the yard this spring. I got it out and patched the hole, but apparently she had a litter, during the time she was in the yard. Now there are little rabbits all over. And of course with the chicken wire, they can't get out. Not that they would, my yard is a gourmet smorgasbord!

So I decide I would chase them out. I'd put chicken wire up around a section at a time and corral them. Then open a section of perimeter fence, and flush them out of the yard.
Sounds easy, right? ya, uh huh.
Well, I used a couple of
canes to beat the bushes and plants
to scare the little bugger the direction
I wanted him to go.
But they're still quite small and
very fast!
He would not go out the opening.
And while I was poking the bushes,
One of the canes got stuck,
and I pulled, and WHAM!
Right into my eye!
Thought I poked it right out!
But after a minute,
I realized I could still see.
Whew!
It hurt, but I could see.
I'd be fine.
Later that evening
I realized my eye was red,
This morning, it looks worse.
So maybe a trip to the Doctor is in order.
I swear, every time I go out
in the yard, I injury myself somewhere!


And no, I didn't get the f#%*ing Rabbit!


An Update!
Saw the Doc, he said it was a hemotoma. Which basically is broken blood vessels. I should heal fine in a week or so. He gave me a prescription for an antibiotic in case there was a surface scratch and possible infection.

Mother's Day weekend

Hi all, we're back!
For Mother's Day, we took our motor home to
Muskegon State Park.
The city of Muskegon is on the other end of
Muskegon Lake.
And we were about 90 miles from Lansing.

It's a nice campground on lake
Michigan and Muskegon lake.
We were in the channel campground.
on Muskegon lake near the
channel to lake Michigan. I took this pic from the top of a sand dune.


My Mom lives in Muskegon and
had not seen the motor home yet.
As you can see from the pics,
we had a beautiful site!
A nice large pull thru site with
no neighbors on our right!

We picked up Mom, and took her to see our mo-ho.
She seemed to really like it.
After that we went to Red Lobster for lunch.
We met 3 of my other brothers there.
With their wives and a couple of kids,
we had a group of 11!
Mom was quite surprised!
She thought it was going to be just the 3 of us!
After lunch, I took mom to the "club"(the VFW),

for "refreshments", (cocktails) and some "pull tabs".
(won a little, lost a little)
Later, after we took Mom back to her apartment,
two of my brothers and their families came to the campground to check out our motor home.



It was a nice weekend!

Mother's Day

LOVE YA MOM!

Yep! A good Day

Like I said in my last post, I spent yesterday in Muskegon visiting my Mom. Got there early so I could cut her hair.
Then we went for a drive around the downtown area to see what's new. Then a quick stop at Meijer's for some things she needed,
and then to Red Lobster for lunch!
Mom had the Blackened Catfish. I had their wonderful New Orleans Salmon! Best Salmon ever! And of course
those little Cheddar Biscuits, and an appetizer of Lobster and Crab Stuffed Mushrooms!
After lunch it was off to the local VFW,(Mom's a member, cause Dad served in WWII) where we enjoyed some after dinner cocktails, (they're really cheap there), pull tabs, and sports on their various tv monitors.

It was an enjoyable day.

When I got back home to Lansing, Craig had made a delicious meatloaf dinner!

It doesn't get any better!

.

So this morning, I awaken to THIS!

No.... it's not spring yet!

Maybe in a couple more weeks.

It is still March.

I am impatient.

Another Day

Yesterday was a do nothing day.
It's hard to be ambitious when it's cold and dreary outside. So I stayed in and caught up on some blogs and played my computer game.
Craig did laundry and book work, and then made another delicious meal.
Swiss steak with mashed potatoes and gravy, and scalloped corn.
I was even too lazy to take a pic of that.

Over on It's a blog eat blog world, Mo does a Manic Monday meme.
I was thinking of joining in, but I'm not much of a meme kinda guy.


So today I'll post a few pics of Bobby Gremillion.
Bobby is my nephew, my sister Linda's son.
He was just sent back to Iraq for his second tour.
He arrived safely in Ramadi. The pics here are from
his first tour in 2005. Linda didn't have any current
pics of him in uniform.

So here is one of him in uniform,
in his room on base,
and the tank he trained in.
It"s called a Paladin,
if you want to Google it.

I know everyone has very strong
feelings about this war,
but let's hope all of our service
men and woman get back safely.

Another weekend. Yea!

I'm off to Muskegon to see how Mom's doing. From talking to her and my brother Louie, she sounds like she's doing great!.

For those readers not familiar with Michigan, Lansing is in the middle of the state, it's the Capital, and home of Michigan State University. Muskegon is on the lake, 100 miles to the west. Where I was born and raised. click on the pic.

Craig will be staying home.

He has TONS of paper work to do. He does all the bookkeeping for the salon, and this time of year there is lots! He needs to finish the year end totals for work , estimated taxes, 1099's, and a bunch of other stuff.

I wasn't listening too well, it's all Greek to me. I just let him do it. He is an excellent bookkeeper. Very good with numbers. unbelievably organized!

I was never good at the kind of stuff.

So he does all the bookkeeping, and I do the cleaning, ordering supplies, stocking the retail shelves, and handling the pr stuff for the salon.
I think I got the easy part!

a shorty post

Short post today, have to work 8-8.

Morgan commented that he's seen pics of me and pics of Craig, but no pics of Craig and me. Well, the reason for that is one of us is always taking the picture. We're not ones to ask other people to take pics of us, so I don't have to many. But here's one from the family Christmas that Lori, (my brother Bruce's wife) took and e-mailed to me.



Also playing around with my blog layout.

I added Sonific to the sidebar.
It's a free little music program.
Or maybe it's called a Widget.
I'm not sure. Still trying to learn some of this stuff.
But having fun experimenting.
I can change the songs, so I'll try some different
ones here and there.

I also added a little fireplace. So now you have
a warm fire and soft music to
read by.

Super Sunday

Super Sunday as in, Another work week over! I love the weekends, but then who doesn't? Unless of course you work weekends. Or you don't work at all, then everyday is a weekend. I do work Saturdays, but have Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday off. So that is my 'weekend'. Every one should have three days off each week.

1. You need one to recover from the week,
2. Two do get everything done you can't do during work,
3. And the third to feel like you had a day off!

Of course I work longer hours the other four days, but it's well worth it!

I got an e-mail from my

brother Bruce's wife Lori,

and she sent me some pics

she took at our Christmas

gathering.

Here's a couple of them,

The first one is of me,

my mom, and my

brother Brian's wife, Ruth.

And the second one

is Bruce's wife Lori,

and Craig.

I could post pics of all the nieces and nephews and great nieces and great nephews, but why? Just a lot of kids! You've seen one you've seen them all!

Of course I expect a lot of flack when the mothers read this, but they know I'm just not a kid person. I won't even hold a baby. Ewwww! So it's nothing personal.

Remember, click on the pic for a larger one.

Mom's home

This is my last post of a very lucky lady, my Mom.
She is now back home and happy to be there. She's doing extremely well and expects to go back to work in a couple of weeks.
Oh, and she's getting frisky, if you know what I mean. So any of you lurkers out there waiting for you chance at this lovely lady, the time is now! But first, if you want her phone number, you're gonna need to send me some background info on yourself. She might not be too picky, ( she says she's not gettin any younger) but I'm not gonna let any Tom, little Dick or Harry show up with out knowing he's;

1. A non smoker.
2. Not secretly married.
3. Financially secure.
4. Reasonably good looking.
5. Likes to buy her pretty baubles, and take her places.
6. And is physicaly equipped to satisfy her needs.

So, e-mail me with all the proper documentation, a nice hand written letter why your mister right, and picture proof of you physical credentials, and her phone number is yours!

Good Luck!

Another Mom update

I 've been asked by several readers about my Mom's progress, so I 'm posting an update.

Here's a pic taken today by my brother Louie.
She's still at the nursing home having therapy. Her bruises are healing much better.
And her attitude is good.
She's wants to go home.
But I think they'll keep her till sometime next week.
They want to make sure she's strong enough to get around on her own.

Oh, and I'll make sure I post when she's home and ready to start dating again!

More family

For those who are getting tired of seeing my family, then close your browser ....NOW!
..............................
..............................
Okay,
for the rest of you lurkers, here's a couple of pics.
My sister, who lives in Havelock, North Carolina, wasn't
able to be in Muskegon when our Mom was hospitalised
with her heart attack. But, not wanting to be left out.

She got a copy of the picture Brian's wife Ruth took.

And Photoshopped herself in. Now I've played around

with those programs some, but mine always looked too fake.

I think she did a good job. So here's the before and after.

So even if all her kids weren't there, she at least has a picture of us all together.

Thru the miracle of photo editing!

family Christmas

Today we had the family Christmas.
And there were boatloads of people!

Didn't realize our family had gotten

so large!
My brother Louie and his wife

Bonnie hosted the event.

They live in Zeeland Michigan,

They made the food,

and were wonderful hosts!

All they asked was we bring

some Christmas spirit and a desert.

We sprung mom from the nursing

home for the day. She seemed to

really enjoy the the change of scenery.

She's doing so much better. Still weak,

but we hope she'll get stronger.

Craig and I brought a Craig's family desert.

Called a Graham Cracker Pudding Cake.

It is so tasty!

I know you want it!

Here's the recipe.....

Graham Cracker Pudding Cake

-Graham Crackers

-Chocolate pudding

-Cool Whip

Place crackers on a serving plate,

any shape or size.

Spread pudding on cracker,

about the thickness of the cracker.

Then alternate pudding and

cracker until you reach the

size you want.

Cover and refrigerate till morning.

spread cool whip over top and sides,

maybe some colored sugar sprinkles,

and serve.

It is so tasty!!

Monday

Yesterday afternoon, after we got back from Muskegon, we went to Craig's family Christmas get together. They only see each other about once a year also.
And from some of the e-mails I've gotten, that seems to be the case with a lot of people. Families scattered all over the place, people get busy with their own lives,
time flies by so fast! It was good to catch up with everyone.
And of course, eating great food! One of the best items was the stuffed mushrooms Craig's niece made. Delicious! Best I've had!
She stuffed them with sausage
and cream cheese. Yummy!
I went back for seconds and thirds!
She also made bacon wrapped dates.
Also yummy!
They went too fast to get a pic!
Of course, Craig being the picky
eater he is, wouldn't even try one.
Says he doesn't like Dates.
Then there's me, I'll eat anything!
Well, just about. I have 2 rules when it comes to food.
1. I don't want it looking at me.
(like no head on a fish)
2. I don't want it moving.
( I like it good and dead)

I've also gotten lots of e-mail for cookie and fudge recipes. I'll post them soon!

More Mom

Back from Muskegon. Saw Mom and talked to Louie and Brian about her progress. As you see in the pic, she was badly bruised from the ordeal. But the bruises will heal as so will she. She's still weak physically, but making progress. Her memory is also much better. She doesn't like the nursing home, but who would! There are many permanent residents there. And it can be very
depressing. But I told her to work hard so she won't have to stay there long. It would be nice to spring her by Christmas, but that probably won't
happen.
Thanks again for every one's good wishes!