You are looking at a picture I took from the CBS news page. It is one taken in Oklahoma following yesterdays ice storm. According to the news half a million people are without power and another storm, which is bigger is expected tonight.

Most of the midwestern states are dealing with this storm. We have many bloggers here living in these states. Please take a moment to send a kind thought or prayer to these folks.

I am sure there are many more bloggers that I don't know about living in Oklahoma but Dragonflower, Hollywoodok and Adam_Warlock are three of them that I do know live there. To you three and to any other bloggers affected...you have my prayers that you and your families are safe and warm.

Update:

Officials in Missouri, Kansas and Oklahoma have declared states of emergency.

Ice as much as an inch thick had accumulated on trees, power lines, streets and car windshields Monday in parts of Oklahoma and Missouri, with thinner layers elsewhere. Another inch of ice fell last night.

"This is a big one. We've got a massive situation here and it's probably going to be a week to 10 days before we get power on to everybody," said Ed Bettinger, a spokesman for Public Service Company of Oklahoma. "It looks like a war zone."

Iowa's largest school district closed for the day in Des Moines, telling its nearly 31,000 students to stay home, and kids across most of Oklahoma and in the Kansas City, Mo., area stayed home for a second day.

Schools also were closed in parts of Wisconsin, including Milwaukee Public Schools with 85,000 students. "We thought about our kids on foot," said Milwaukee schools spokeswoman Roseann St. Aubin. Some drivers couldn't even get to their buses, she said.

Nearly 600,000 Oklahoma homes and businesses still have no electricity today, most of them since Monday when power lines began snapping under the weight of ice and falling branches — the biggest power outage in state history. Utilities in Missouri reported more than 100,000 homes and business without power and Kansas utilities said more than 100,000 were blacked out Tuesday, with some in the dark since Sunday.

Iowa's two major utilities reported over 17,000 customers without power Tuesday.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Army Corps of Engineers sent 50 generators and three truckloads of bottled water from Texas to distribute to blacked-out areas of Oklahoma.

At least 22 deaths — most of them in traffic accidents — had been blamed on the ice and cold since the weekend, including 15 in Oklahoma, four in Kansas, and three in Missouri.

This situation must be affecting quite a few of our fellow bloggers. If it really does take a couple of weeks for the crews to get the power back on it will be nearly Christmas before our blog buddies affected by this storm return.

"If everyone cared and nobody cried
If everyone loved and nobody lied
If everyone shared and swallowed their pride
Then we'd see the day when nobody died
If everyone cared and nobody cried
If everyone loved and nobody lied
If everyone shared and swallowed their pride
Then we'd see the day when nobody died" (Nickelback lyrics from the song 'If Everyone Cared")

In Oneida County, NY there is a woman who was scammed out of a large portion of her life savings. She signed up on a matchmaking website, and met a man who claimed he was the owner of a construction company based in Arizona. After months of online conversations, phone calls and cards sent back and forth she heard from him that his business had suffered some finanacial setbacks. He needed to see the bank about obtaining a loan. Being, she believed, his significant other, she volunteered to send him the needed money. He took some convincing that he should accept her offer and she was so proud of the fact that she had wisely chosen this type of man as a possible life mate. You can't go wrong with a man that feels taking money from a woman isn't what he wants in life, now can you? Now there's the kind of man a woman in her 50's needs in her life...right?

She sent him the money, he cashed the check and that was the last she heard of the man or her money. Since she can't recover her money from him whoever he really was, she is looking in to suing the website. The website was not named in the news segment, but it's an expensive site to belong to and she felt that this kind of site should have been more careful about the type of person they recommended to her. My guess, and this is a guess only, is that it might have been EHarmony.com.

From what I understand, that site costs around $200 to belong to. It supposedly takes hours to fill out the application and they don't take just anyone. The advertising for the site gives the impression that it is much more careful and safer than the other sites of that nature. Given that advertising, and the cost, I would expect that they would be a safer site to belong to. However, if it isn't, I don't believe they should be held liable for financial losses incurred by it's members in the event of their failure to protect themselves. Reputable sites do the best they can to protect their users, but ultimately the responsibility lies with the behavior of their users. If you don't have sense enough to protect yourself from scammers, how can the site do it?

Internet bullying regardless of where it happens is a fact of life online. Scammers work their trade in real life, why wouldn't they use the internet as a tool also? Facebook and Myspace are being investigated by various state Attorney General offices for the way they handle the accounts of their teen members. Since when should a website take the responsibility of controlling what a teen does online when their parents don't? How does anyone know that the birthdates we give when we sign up on any site are accurate? I do agree that if a policy regarding age is in place, then the website should stick to that policy and not allow younger members. Neither Myspace nor Facebook is in the habit of that. Ultimately it is the responsibility of the parents to watch what their children do online. Yet even with all of the information out there, parents still have very little idea what their kids are putting in their profiles nor what kind of information they are inadvertently giving out during their conversations with other "kids".

The sad fact of internet life is it is fraught with danger for any one of us. Identity theft, bullying, lies told to manipulate people into parting with money are all pitfalls of the anonymous nature of the internet. We can try to stay away from it, we can ignore it, we could even stay offline to avoid it. I believe that sooner or later big government will stick their noses into this mess and we aren't going to like what their decisions will be. We have a long history of allowing our government to do for us what we won't do for ourselves. Is there any real way to stop unethical behavior online? I don't really know, but I can't help thinking that" if everyone cared and nobody lied" there'd be a much safer internet. Dreamer, aren't I

Last night I went to finetune and put this playlist together, gathered my graphics and scooted (without boots) over to Bella's Gotta Brand New Blog. She had a chat up and that looked happenin' so I hung around. Today I sit here grinnin' at myself because I've lost the train of thought that tied all this together. Oh yeah, I'm gettin' a real laugh out of all this. If finetune would allow these tunes to be listed in the order I chose them instead of alphabetically I'd remember what the connection was.



This playlist started in my mind while I was driving along yesterday. The radio channel I always listen to when driving was an Oldies channel. It played mostly 70's music with some 80's thrown in for good measure. It was in many cases the place where I would hear something and think that I needed to use it on Saturday night in Blogstream. On Monday of this week, Imus came back on the air. The radio channel I listen to was one of his oldest affiliates. They changed from whatever broadcasting company they were affiliated with to CBS so that they could continue to carry Imus. They did this at the request of their "regular" listeners. CBS format is entirely different from what the format was.

It used to have DJ's like the Doc of Rock, Bruce Melnick. It used to have contests and call ins. Now, it has an automated announcement that "this is Drive Radio, and it's all about the music." The automated announcement says so. Except for the hours of 6am to 10am when it's all Imus. The "regular" listeners are all children of the 60's and 70's. We "love" The Who, The Stones, America, Toto and the Beatles. I'm not sure if we "love" Beck, Drowning Pool, Saliva, Rage Against The Machine and Smashing Pumpkins. I like them, but do I "love" them?

I get into the car, start it up, let it warm a bit and then flip on the radio to my Oldies channel only to hear Beck sing "Loser". I checked to make sure the channel was 92.7FM. It was. I'm all about curiosity so I left it there to see what was up. Next tune was "Click Click Boom" by Saliva. That was followed by some advertising and the automated announcement. Drive Radio. Oh yes, it's Drive Radio all right. I wonder if some of the "regular" listeners are happy? We have given up the "Music of our lives" and the Doc of Rock, for Imus and Drive Radio. Oh, and I'm not one of those "regular" listeners that requested The Imus Show. I support his right to free speech, and did listen to him on occasion, but I'm not a big fan of "talk" radio. I listen for the music. I plan on giving it a fair chance, and if I decide I need an older Oldies fix, I'll just change the channel..."Click Click Boom".



The Playlist

1....Brooks and Dunn...Boot Scootin' Boogie. Little Miss Honkytonk, and My Maria
2....Charlie Daniels...Simple Man, The Devil Went Down To Georgia and The Legend of Wooley Swamp
3....Craig Chaquico...Acoustic Planet, Forbidden Love and Turquoise Moon
4....Dave Koz...Careless Whisper, Honey Dipped and The Dance
5....Dr. Hook & The Medicine Show...Queen of the Silver Dollar, Sylvia's Mother and the Cover of the Rolling Stone
6....Drowning Pool...Reason I'm Alive, Rebell Yell and Shame
7....Eagles...Heartache Tonight, Life in the Fast Lane and Seven Bridges Road
8....Nickelback...If Everyone Cared, Photograph and Rockstar
9....Parliament/ QTip...Flashlight, Give Up The Funk and Supergroovalisticprosifuncstication (The Bump Bump Song)
10...Pure Prarie League...Amie, I Can't Stop This Feeling and Let Me Love You Tonight
11...Saliva...Click Click Boom, Superstar and Survival of the Sickest
12...Shania Twain...Honey I'm Home, That Don't Impress Me Much and Whose Bed Have Your Boots Been Under.
13...Sly and the Family Stone...Dance To The Music, Everyday People and Family Affair
14...Tim McGraw...Live Like You Were Dying, Real Good Man and Refried Dreams
15...Trisha Yearwood...Everybody Knows, She's In Love With The Boy and Walkaway Joe

I went to give Bashful her insulin shot last night and found her in her favorite place on top of Hubby's chest of drawers. I took a minute to look out the window before turning the bedroom light on. I wanted to see what, if anything, was out there. Although I live in the country this small park is the proud possessor of the only streetlight to be found for miles. It amazed me how much you could actually see. It doesn't really illuminate anything exactly, it just gives a glow to the snow that has fallen which makes the darkness less dense. Standing there looking at all the diamond glints on the unbroken surface of the snow I was aware of movement off to my left. It took time for my eyes to adjust to the darkness but I had the pleasure of seeing a buck with quite a large rack. I couldn't count the points in the dark, but I've never seen a live buck with a full set of antlers before. If he hadn't moved I wouldn't have seen him at all. It made me curious about what she sees regularly that I don't see at all. Had I just gone in and turned on the light to administer her shot, I never would have had the pleasure of observing what I believe might be an elder statesman of the deer world.

I go about my business all day long and I've never before asked myself whether or not I'm missing anything. I suppose I'm not missing anything of importance to my life really. It was, after all, just a buck standing in the snow. It isn't going to pay my bills, or clean my house. It certainly won't run my errands, and will definitely cream my vehicle if he gets out into the road in front of me with no time to avoid him. He will probably eat my flowers when I plant them and just generally make a nuisance of himself in ways I can't yet imagine. But...he was beautiful and had such a huge rack of horns that he provided me with a sight that was out of the ordinary for me. I always thought that deer antlers were white, like the ones on the trophy head that Oldest has hanging on his wall. If they had been, I would have been able to count the points, but they're more of an ivory shade and don't pick up the glow from the streetlight as well as the snow does. If it weren't for the cat and the snow I might not have seen him at all.

Periodically on weekends we hear the sound of gunfire in the woods. Hunting season has now ended I believe, and I'm wondering if he was what they were shooting at. Of course there's no way of telling, because he might not be doing anything more than passing through. He might not live in the woods behind or next to me, he might live miles away from here and have been searching for food or shelter, or someplace where the guns didn't disturb his life. I wonder how old he is, how long it will be before he loses his antlers, or if he'll lose them at all? I wonder if he'll find enough food to stay healthy during the winter? I wonder what his life is really like. Is it as harsh as I believe it to be?

Something disturbed him and he leaped back into the woods out of my sight so I turned on my light and gave Bashful her shot. Usually she argues a bit when I push the plunger in, but yesterday she just sat quietly watching out that window. Afterwards she turned and gave me an affectionate headbutt. As I was standing there scratching her ears and listening to her purr, I was wondering if she understood just how lucky she is. She has a home, meals provided on demand. She has windows that allow the sun to shine in and create patches of warmth that she can snooze in. She can hunt dust bunnies or strings when she's in the mood. Even an occasional mouse for excitement. Unlike that buck who must fend for himself in the real world, she has the life of a pampered house cat. I wonder if she appreciates that.

It doesn't really matter. Thanks to a nightly ritual that occurs without any real thought on my part, I was blessed with one of those quiet shining moments of peace. One of those tears in the fabric of our lives that allows a glimpse of a world beyond the day to day grind. One of those times when everything slows down enough to hear the quiet purr of a cat or see the way that light creates diamonds in the snow.

A little over a month ago we listed our phone numbers on the Federal Do Not Call list. We've never done that before because of our business. When the list was first created there was the disclaimer that it wouldn't stop companies we regularly do business with from calling us. Doing business with someone is a tacit agreement to accept their calls, so we believed that it would be fruitless to sign up.

Over the period of the last year, our telemarketer calls have increased dramatically to as many as 40 or 50 a day. In addition to that, recently 5 of these companies started calling Hubby on his cell phone. Usually we just hung up on these calls but that seems to have angered the companies enough to start calling us over and over again. On Hubby's business line we pay by the calls received and it was getting out of hand. It doubled his business phone bill which is high enough to start out with. Hubby usually figures it's me calling his cell phone with something important and had to scramble to answer only to find out it was a telemarketer. When doing certain types of jobs, this small interruption means he has to let go of something which sometimes means he has to start the process from the beginning. When you've worked carefully to get a pipe lined up correctly letting it go can mean the difference between getting it connected quickly or spending the next 15 minutes doing it all over again. He could ignore it, but if he's all ready asked me to hold calls and his phone is ringing, I might be having an emergency, so he'll answer.

These calls are not coming from companies we do business with. They are calls from long distance call providers, tool sellers, gas and electric providers, advertising sales, and extended warranty offers. Add to that the number of charities which still have the right to call you even if you are listed and we're talking a bunch of calls. Some of these telemarketing groups are unscrupulous operators, they pose as the company that is all ready providing us with service. I find the long distance providers to be guilty of that more than any other company. Not only is this annoying, but in a few cases may have cost us business. We have call waiting so we can determine whether or not to answer the incoming call, but an incoming call can cut out part of the conversation you are all ready having. Some people do not have patience when you keep asking them to repeat something because you didn't get it the last two times, thanks to the incoming interruption.

There have been times when I've been interrupted working in another room and had to beat feet to get to the phone, only to find it's someone I don't want to answer anyways. This gets really frustrating if I'm doing end of the month bookkeeping. I'm adding long columns of figures then and can lose track of where I was. So, desperation drove me to the website and I signed up. It said that it takes about a month to slow the calls down and that has proved to be the case. This week so far we've only had one telemarketer call. However, some of the companies have found a way to get around this.

What they are doing is using automated operators. You answer the call to hear a canned voice saying that your automobile warranty is about to expire, you need to call the number they will provide you in order to extend it. Once you've called that number, you are opening yourself up for numerous calls from whatever company is using this tactic, plus you can't report the company for violating the Do Not Call list because until you call them, you have no idea what company you're talking to. Once you've called them, you have created an agreement to accept calls from them. Pretty shrewd tactic if you ask me, because many people buy extended warranties. We even did it once, before we learned better.



We purchased a Sears Kenmore washing machine back in 1989. The extended warranty added $50 to the purchase price. It covered the machine for a period of 3 years. Supposedly in addition to the 1 year warranty on the machine. In the fine print at the bottom of the contract, which of course neither of us had the patience to read was the disclaimer that the machine was NOT covered if we installed it in a mobile home. It was installed in the apartment we had and was there for the first year we had it. Then we moved into our mobile home. One month before the end of the warranty period the dump valve on the washing machine wouldn't close. The machine wouldn't fill with water. We called Sears, spoke to the service department who told us that they would send a serviceman out the next day. They did say there might be a minimal charge for service.

He came, and never said a word about the violation of the extended warranty terms until after he made the repairs. The minimal charge for service amounted to $165. We purchased the washing machine on sale for something like $350 plus tax. We paid, and the replaced dump valve lasted for 4 more years. At which time Youngest purchased a new washing machine for us at Lowes in Niskayuna, New York. He was working there at the time. Between the sale price and his employees discount the washing machine cost $199.00. No extended warranties and it's been 10 years without any kind of problem at all.

The only telemarketing call we've received this week so far, has been an automated operator call offering to extend the warranty on our car. It's a 2001 model and the original warranty would have been violated because the garage I bought it from was not a Chevrolet service garage. It can't be coming from Chevrolet because I was never registered with Chevrolet as the owner. I wonder how many people will buy that extended warranty?