Must Haves this Winter

With everyone making lists of the best gifts to give this year, please let me list a few things for your own self that I find help make any day a bit brighter and more-better-bearable.
Since I have been stomping this planet for so long, I have tried lots of stuff and can, with a large chunk of certainty say that these items are worth your hard earned cash.
You can trust me on this because I spent my own cash to get them. They are not promotional gifts.....dadgummit.

1)

Oil of Olay

Every woman human needs this stuff. While it doesn't remove wrinkles, it makes your skin feel so fresh and good you won't care.....as much. I went through 2 bottles of this stuff (and still counting) making my swollen, hurty broken wrist skin feel better. It is not heavy on your skin or greasy. Put a light coat on your face, after your morning wash and your smile will thank you. Heck, I use this lotion on some of my wood furniture to give it a nourished look.
Besides it smells nice.

2)

Harney and Sons Chamomile Tea Sachets

Tea. Gotta love it. Well you don't gotta but I do because while I was young and growing up my Mom's best friend was English so tea was always brewing in our house. Plus if we were sick, we were always given hot tea and saltine crackers. Now-a-days I find that the soothing taste of chamomile tea in the evenings is the best way to relax. Many, many brands and varieties have passed over my lips but the simplicity, natural sweetness, and heavenly aroma of Harney and Sons is all my palette requires. Their website could use some updating, but their teas are wonderful.
Besides the little sachets are adorable and make me feel fancy.

3)

Ester-C Vitamin C

All vitamin C's are not created equal. These are truly the best. They have a little bit of a smooth coating, so they don't taste powdery or get stuck on the way down. After I don't know how many years of taking them, they have never upset my stomach. They are kind of big so sometimes I cut them in half, because I hate taking pills and because 500mg is the smallest mg I have ever found. If you are feeling a little droopy or scratchy throated then take these to knock those sick germs back to last week.
Besides it will keep you from getting scurvy.

4)

Max Freeze

I had never heard of this stuff till my sister came to take care of me whilst I was broken bone recovering. She uses it on a bad knee. It is amazing. It goes on like a roll-on deoderant with only a slight odor in the beginning and no weird skin feel after. But it will reduce your aches and pains in just a few minutes like a prescription drug all the while being just about as all-natural as you can get. I will always have it in my medicine cabinet from now on.
Besides it is made in the U.S.A. - Like me !

5)

Grandma's Pure Soap

I got this soap because a) it had the word Grandma on it. b) it has lye in it and c) it is good for dry skin.
There are 3 ingredients and thats it. Lard, Water and Lye. I can picture a hardworking woman stirring a large bubbling, steaming pot of soap over an open fire with smooth, acne free skin. My 'lives far away' daughter who also loves it says she can really tell a difference in her complexion since she started using it. I use it because it really does not dry out your skin or leave any kind of residue. It also lasts a long time. Over a month with daily use for me. Now I'm no soap scientist, but it just feels better, cleans better, lathers better and rinses much better than grocery store bars or liquids, so my ancient, well used skin appreciates it
Besides it makes me feel like a strong pioneer woman. And soap is as close as I'm gonna get to that scenario.

Hope you find this list helpful in some tiny way, but these items seem important at any age and I thought you should know.

You're Welcome.


Thanks for being here.


Shopping Links:
1) Oil of Olay
2) Chamomile Tea
3) Ester C
4) Max Freeze
5) Grandma's Soap

The Happy Quest

I read the following post yesterday and thought that it spoke so well about one of the directions folks have chosen to cope with difficulties in life that I needed to share it with you.
Rachelle works in the very south of Georgia, is a great blog writer, loving family member and the best sister anyone could have......

Thursday, November 20, 2014

Going Off The Rails On a Crazy Train

Today there is no quest for happiness on my part. There is only the question why?!

This will not be one of my usual posts where I try to find humor in something or at least convey a situation that may not be humorous in a comical way. The voices in my head are screaming today and there is not enough white noise in the world to shut them up.

There was a shooting last night at FSU. Another shooting at a school; what the hell. What has transformed the minds of so many Americans that now the only answer to anyone’s pain or anger is to use a gun? I don’t understand it at all.

Every mass shooting I hear about makes me die a little inside as I wonder what has happened to our values and why we have gotten on some downward spiral into anarchy. Actually I know the answer, but it isn’t ‘politically correct’ so I will keep it to myself. Being ‘PC’ has also started to make me crazy because it has taken on a life of its own and it seems that no one is allowed to have an opinion anymore – unless it is also the opinion of whoever you are talking to. God forbid we ‘agree to disagree.’

This shooting hit me the hardest however because I live near FSU. It is just too close to home. I work at a small university that is about 30 minutes from FSU and my son goes to UGA. I am too close geographically to the latest incident and my son is too geographically far away from me. So, we are both at schools and they seem to be escalating to #1 on the hit list.

My job is to collect tuition and fees. I am the one that gets all the angry phone calls from students and parents telling me I am wrong – that they don’t owe money – when I am right. So many times, even when I try to explain it calmly, the situation escalates; on the phone and in person. I have had to tell people ‘that I will never be able to tell them what they want to hear’ – literally. That never ends well. I have had to tell people that I will not talk to them until they calm down or until they stop cursing. The venom can be spewed at me for as little as $10. It has happened. It seems that hardly anyone is able to think rationally anymore – or do math.

I honestly wonder every day if I will go home that night. I wonder will I have made the wrong person angry. You just never know anymore.

I also wonder every day about my son at UGA. Will he be in the wrong place at the wrong time when someone loses their mind and wants to kill innocent people for no other reason than they are ‘hurting?” How is that the answer to whatever pain they are in??!!

The news showed videos this morning that students had taken and streamed to their station. One was of a group of students huddling by the book shelves as the announcement played over the loud speaker about how there had been a shooting and what they were supposed to do. All I could think of during the video was what if Austin was one of those students? I am not the type of person that cries – ever. This made me cry.

It also made me think about when my daughter was at college and a tornado came through the town. Her call, from another person’s phone because she had to run to safety and she didn’t pick up her own phone, scared the living daylights out of me. She was fine, the town was not. But even so, I didn’t sleep for days. I still worry about her every day in Atlanta. Atlanta is a big, crazy city full of the same dangers.

But, I understand weather and what causes things like tornados (but it doesn’t mean I like them), conversely, this type of mentality – the shooting mentality – I DO NOT understand.

I grow tired of wondering everyday if this will be my last day on earth because someone else can’t cope. I am scared for the rest of my family. It seems no place is safe anymore and I hate that.

We are literally living the Ozzy Osbourne chorus of “Crazy Train”, and I am ready to get off.


Find more from The Happy Quest at  http://ifyouarehappyandyoudonotknowit.blogspot.com

Thanks for being here.....
And there.

"Vegetables for one, please."

Animals get us.
Not like hunter/prey get us.
They 'understand' us.
We don't understand them though and as humans we totally abuse our animal relationship.
But they are much more aware of whats going on around them than we give them credit for and probably just shake their animal heads at our pompous ways.
(Have you ever tried to catch your cat to give it it's medicine? They know. They totally know.)
They don't even speak human, well except for a few parrots and they understand much more than we give them credit for.
My dogs can not leave me alone now that I am 'broken'.
(I broke my wrist in a bumbling fall on concrete; Surgery, pins, cast, the works)
They sniff my arm and want to lay their heads on the cast.
They are constantly trying to lick my badly skinned up knee.
Its their way of playing doctor, I guess.
Which brings me to this.....
When I saw this sweet story, I cried.
Please check it out.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/11217366/Horse-brought-to-hospital-to-say-goodbye-to-its-dying-owner.html

I love animals or maybe I just need to double up my pain medicine today, but I so get this story.
Animals make life worth living.
Many people woud agree with me but could only acknowledge the truth of my statement as long it comes with fries and a drink.
I just can't do it.
"Vegetables for one, please."

Thanks for being here.

But have I mentioned....?

What a weekend it was.
Crazy, crazy.
There were Day of the Dead celebrations everywhere.
Halloween parties for young and old.
Trick or Treating in the streets.
Voodoo Fest in New Orleans
Friday the 13th even tried to disquise itself as the 31st this year, but since I'm mildly dyslexic I saw right through that one.
But have I mentioned....that I broke my wrist this weekend?
I wasn't even participating in any of the many festive activities when it happened, so it was just a totally unimaginative, awkward, embarassing, uncoordinated and mostly laughable display of bone breakage.



I stepped on a rock going down a small cement hill that knocked me off balance and this stumbling, flailing, hefty human picked up speed all the way to the bottom of that hill.
My wrist finally came to the rescue and stopped the 'once in motion always in motion' beast that I had become.
I survived the fall but my wrist was badly wounded and was taken to not 1 but 2 emergency rooms so it could tell the world how carelssly it had been treated.
After hours of paperwork, skin freezing, pain shots, waiting, Chinese finger traps (I am not making that up), ring cutting off, more waiting, x-rays, ice packs, bone twisting, stretching and putting back in place, cast making, more waiting and finally release from the house of horror hospital, my wrist and I arrived home relieved that we were free from probing doctors, interns and nurses.
WRONG.
Have I mentioned....that the follow-up Doctor tells me there is 50-50 chance my bone could 'slip' back out of place and I would need surgery.......
There was a sucking sound in the room as my will to live was temporarily removed.
I am already overwhelmed with how much I CAN'T do that the thought of doing even less sends me into a spiral of sofa laying, TV watching, book reading, phone game playing flurry of bone protecting non-activity.
Hey wait.
I said that like it's a bad thing.
Well it must be because now I'm feeling painful discomfort and laziness guilt.
This is like a bad dream that I can't wake up from.
But have I mentioned....that I AM awake and one handedly typing this post to authenticate the fact that it all really happened.
Really.

Thanks for being here.