Archive for April, 2011


Inspection day

Filed under: Important Stuff — 1 Comment
April 30, 2011

On the last possible day I got the car inspected. I am always nervous when I go, not being particularly savvy concerning cars, I am always worried something is wrong that I have no clue about.

The car passes, with only two things I had to get fixed. A brake light and the wipers. Stitch had been telling me for weeks the car needed new wipers. He was right. Then when I went to pay, the bill was much more then I was expecting, as I questioned her we went through the charges, inspection, brake light, 4 wipers …. wait, how many wipers? Yes that was a mistake. So they fixed that, I paid the bill and I don’t have to worry about inspection for another year.

And that’s all, says she.

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A work of art

Filed under: Family N Friends, Important Stuff — 3 Comments

New York State has an inspection program, all vehicles registered in New York have to have a safety inspection and an emissions inspection every 12 months. My car is due for its inspection in April. A fact I was reminded of when I went through a check point on Tuesday. I went through it twice once on the way to my doctor and then on the way back. I guess the police in my town don’t have anything better to do on Tuesday afternoon.

During the winter, a snow plow broke my driver’s side mirror. This would cause my car to fail the inspection. I had told the boy to take car of it, and he didn’t, so this week I was scrambling to find a mirror. There were mirrors available online but I was worried I wouldn’t get in time. So I called the local auto parts store, they said they could get it, to be delivered to their store the next day.

The boys went to get it since the store closes before I get home. I got a text from Stitch, “The mirror is black not silver hahahaha”. There was no way I could get another one before the end of the month. His response to that was “Ok. So itll just look funny. Very funny. Lol funny.” “Gives the car spunkiness”

So the car is now unique, I was driving with Gwen and going “It’s black! It’s black!” She grinned at me. “Amy says she is a work of art.” Good way to look at it.

And that’s all, says she.

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At Least 54 Dead in Storms Across South

Filed under: News, United States of A, Weather
April 27, 2011

Breaking News Alert
The New York Times
Wed, April 27, 2011 — 10:52 PM ET
—–

At Least 54 Dead in Storms Across South

A deadly tornado stretching a mile wide tore through downtown Tuscaloosa, Ala., on Wednesday evening, destroying homes and buildings and bringing further damage to a region already battered by storms.

Across the state, at least 25 people were killed by storms on Wednesday alone, said Valerie Hayes, a spokeswoman for the Alabama Emergency Management Agency. But that number did not include any deaths from Tuscaloosa, where 15 people were confirmed dead by the mayor’s office and 100 were said to be injured, The Tuscaloosa News reported. Earlier in the day, with the damage spreading and the death toll rising, Gov. Robert Bentley declared a state of emergency. And The Associated Press reported that across the South, storms Wednesday killed 11 people in Mississippi, two in Georgia and one in Tennessee.

Read More: NY Times

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Close encounters of the Arachnid variety

Filed under: Environment — 6 Comments

One of the things that happens when you live in a basement apartment is you get creepy crawlies. This past month I have had 4 close encounters with spiders. I’m not afraid of spiders, I just don’t want those eight legged terrorists in my living space.

The first encounter was when I was on my bed reading, I looked up I think because my phone buzzed, only to see a spider next to my head, suspended from the ceiling on a web string. I swatted him/her/it away and then jumped to smash it and it disappeared.

The second was in my bathroom, I was sitting on the toilet and it crawled out from under my sink. I pulled my feet up off the floor, before I could do anything else it crawled back under the sink.

Then tonight as I was getting ready for church I noticed a little one on my door, I picked up my Croc (its a shoe) and hit it. The spider fell to the floor, it was still moving and it went under my door, still holding the Croc I opened the door and it was gone. So after being hit on the head, falling from a height that for you and me would be the equivalent of the Empire State Building, it was able to run away. Disgusted at the fact that it got away, I dropped the Croc and shut the door, there on the outside of the door was a huge big ugly eight legged monster. I grabbed a fabric softener bottle and whacked it. Dead. So that is Spiders 3, Bella 1. That makes me the Astros.

That is why I sleep with my blankets over my head. Oh and don’t even get me started on the f***ing centipedes.

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In the world of baseball

Filed under: Sports — 2 Comments

Phil Hughes continues to be on the D.L. with what is being referred to as right shoulder inflammation, the Yankees term was “dead arm”. He had a set back, after throwing 12 pitches in a bullpen session he reported feeling deadness and fatigue in his arm. He has been sent for tests and hopefully the doctors will find out what is wrong and fix it.

Francisco Cervelli is scheduled to catch on Tuesday and Wednesday for Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre and could be activated as early as Thursday.

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Overwhelmed, but thankful

Filed under: Emotions, Family N Friends, Personal not private, Sports, Technology, The World — 8 Comments
April 26, 2011

When I checked my e-mail, I saw a lot of e-mails from WordPress. It surprised me, I get a few comments now and then, but this was highly unusual. As I read through the comments they seemed to have a theme, “Don’t quit.” One comment by Rex: “Well, Bella, if you don’t get a lot of comments today, I don’t know what else would work.” Then I read this comment by Debbi is 24atHeart and the last sentence was: “(BTW – congrats on being recognized today by The Daily Post!)”

My response to that was “What?” I played with my iPhone until I figured out how to show the sidebar, clicked on the link to The Daily Post to find a blog post titled: Help a friend not quit Post a Day. In case you don’t want to click on the link I’ll summerize, in this post Scott mentions that someone, who may or may not be named Bella Foxx was thinking of quiting Post A Day.

Can you help her out by stopping by her blog today, A Commuter’s journal, and giving her some Daily Post love on her post? In Likes and Comments? Or just drop a comment here with a short word of encouragement? Thanks.

People came, I got 474 hits on my blog that day. That is the most ever, today I have 115 so far. And comments were left. Every time I checked my e-mail there were more comments. 31 on one post (Topic #107: What percentage of Americans believe in the devil?), 9 on Baseball season and a few others scattered around to other posts. Some people even left multiple comments. I was, in a word, overwhelmed.

The comments ranged from “Don’t quit” and “Maybe you could try Post A Week” to “You might need to take a short break from blogging”. Some made a comment about the post and then said very briefly, “Don’t quit”. Some were quite complementary, like this one: jerzygirl45: “At least your stuff is incredibly coherent and readable.”; and Chuck: “Well, if an excellent writer is thinking about giving up her blog, then a hack such as myself, should bury his or her head under piles of crumpled virtual paper. Don’t stop!” I’m going to have to buy a bigger hat.

Seriously though, I have gotten some good ideas and some encouragement and a whole lot of, “People are reading my blog! Squeeee!” Most of all, if you can feel love coming from a website, I have felt the love and it has given me the energy to keep going, to muddle through this dry spell and keep writing.

My heartfelt thanks to each and every one of you.

And that is all, says she.

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Say good-night

Filed under: Uncategorized — 4 Comments

Lots of comments today, I read every one. I wrote a reply to everyone. I am going to write a blog post about how they made me feel. Tomorrow. Right now. SLEEEEEEP.

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Topic #107: What percentage of Americans believe in the devil?

Filed under: Miscellanea, United States of A — 67 Comments
April 24, 2011

According to a Gallup Poll, nearly 70% of Americans believe in the Devil. Do you? Why or why not? Why do you think 70% of Americans believe as they do on this issue? Do you think this number is higher or lower than other countries in the world? Why? Do you think the devil is behind the choice of this topic?

Yes I believe in the Devil, I believe he is real, a wicked spirit creature. I believe because I am a religious person and believe what is taught in the Bible. The Bible talks about the Devil as a real spirit person. I am not sure about the number of Americans, I think many say they believe in the Devil when in reality they believe more in an evil force that causes bad things to happen.

As to whether or not the number of people is greater or less in other countries, that depends on the country. I think that in some countries the number of people who believe in the devil is much higher, there again it would depend on the religious demographics in the country.

Do I think the Devil is behind the choice of this topic? Well, I do believe that the Devil is the ruler of this world, but I don’t think he is behind every little thing that happens. I think he has influence over people,so maybe ….

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Baseball season

Filed under: Sports — 18 Comments

It is now baseball season which is causing me a slight problem. When I started the Post-a-day promise I was a little worried that when baseball started I would fall behind on this blog. I reasoned that if I was in the habit of posting everyday, it wouldn’t happen. Well it has, a little bit but so far I have been able to catch up, if not posting everyday, I have the same number of posts as days in the week. I still feel like I am a failure in blogging.

However, on my Yankee blog, I have posted for every game so far this year, in fact I even made up a button, “Post-a-game-2011”. That is where the problem is, I am having to write two blog posts almost every day. I don’t want either post to be a two-liner, or just a link to a new article I found interesting. I have noticed a steady stream of hits on my blog and I am starting to think I have regular readers and I don’t want to disappoint them.

I will do my absolute best to stay on top of this blog. However if it gets too hard I might switch to the post a week promise.

That is all, says she.

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Raining in Manhattan

Filed under: Beauty, Family N Friends, Manhattan, Technology, Weather — 6 Comments

Em had a nail appointment so we went to the city even though it was raining. The rain was supposed to stop at noon, it didn’t. It stopped eventually, but a long time after noon. I wore my gray coat and figured that would be enough, I wouldn’t need my rain poncho. I was wrong. As for the common sense factor of going to the city to walk around in the pouring rain, we went to NYC when a hurricane was coming. Yeah, common sense doesn’t come into play when we plan to go the city. Two things you will notice about me when it’s raining in the city. One is I never carry an umbrella. The other is that instead of waiting for the light at the curb, I stand back by the buildings. There is a little bit of protection there, it the wind is strong I can usually get out of it by going around the corner. Also, there is less chance of being splashed by cars.

When we first got to Manhattan I wanted to get food, Em had this store she wanted to go to that she didn’t want to take me to. We were going to meet up at this coffee place that I had a Groupon for that I won’t name, you’ll see why in a minute. The store she wanted to go to wasn’t open, so she went to the Apple store to get an iPod Shuffle, (PRODUCT) RED Special Edition iPod, a portion of the purchase price to the Global Fund to fight AIDS in Africa. She wants it for music when she goes to the gym, currently she has an iPod touch, but she is planning to get an iPhone in June or July and she doesn’t want to take that to the gym. So she was very happy to find it at the Apple store. Then she came to join me at the coffee place.

She was starving, but they only had pastries and sandwiches, we ended up just getting drinks. The cappuccino looked just like the picture in the Groupon I got. The service was terrible. First I was told they provided table service. So we sat down, no one came to our table so I went up to the bar and ordered our drinks. The waitress brought them, after drinking them, Em had to leave for her appointment. I waited for the check. And waited and waited. Finally she brought it, then took the Groupon to refigure the bill. Then she never came back for the money. I waited almost 20 minutes before I took it up to the bar, she acted surprised when she saw me. The place is in the lobby of a hotel, so they have hotel guests charging things to their room, but it is also open to the public, so come on! I left her less then 10% for a tip.

After meeting up with Em at the nail salon we decided to try another place for the items she was looking for in the store she wouldn’t let me come with her to. Then we used one of her Groupon’s for lunch. This place had much better service even though the waitress appeared to be less experienced. Not saying she was, just that was the impression I got, but our order was right and she was prompt, it was more of a bar then a restaurant but the food was good.

Then to Ashley’s so Em could get another hole poked in her ear, then to Harney’s for tea, then home where we watched the end of the baseball game.

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