So another rave about advertising/marketing… Yesterday I received a letter from ‘Stephen Brandt’ of Westlake Village, CA. on what looks like Countrywide Home loan official letterhead. We are a current customer of theirs (although after this I do question that!) The letter offers us the opportunity to refinance our home loan to a new 30 year fixed to save an “Estimated Annual Payment Savings” of $6,925.

What the letter ensures it does not say is that we currently have a 15 yr fixed. So for the savings of about $577 a month, I can refinance (to a higher rate!) and spread the payments over 30 years instead of 15 years and pay the monthly payment of $1961 for an additional 15 years! Lucky Me!

Let’s look at the numbers:
$1961 x 12 months x 15 additional years = $352,980 in additional payments
And I also get to pay 2 points on the refinance… all on cute yellow paper with a table of impressive looking numbers.

Now of course this $577 may save someone from filing bankcruptcy but that aint us…

To be fair I guess the small faint print at the bottom on the back of the letter should not be overlooked by the desperate:
“Important Information: Please Read…” It is even underlined.

I think we have wasted enough time on Countrywide… and I am a blonde!

Have you seen the latest ad? Yes, I know some will say that any buzz from a commecial is good buzz but I really hate the commericals that insult the intelligence or better yet make the merchant look stupid. What can I say except put the new A1 ad in the latter category. Any sauce bottle that takes that much effort for a single drop has three major marketing flaws (and possibly more);

1. The sauce bottle is suitable only for the physically fit, and possibly on a condiment diet!
2. Haven’t they heard of the squeeze bottle?
3. Use less = buy less!

I would think that the merchant would want us to use copious amounts of the sauce, using up the contents of the bottle quickly so that we need to purchase more.

Is A1 steak sauce REALLY that important? I don’t think so!

to the tune of auld lang syne seemed to be the anthem of many in their twenties (and on either side!) I was fortunate to visit the USA for 6 months and back pack around this vast country. To my surprise & delight I was just old enough to drink alcohol in public the day I arrived. This was not something I had considered when planning my trip as the drinking age in Australia was 18 years.

But I was a sensible drinker and often made the conscious decision not to over indulge in a country where I was most often travelling alone. So I would always order light beer! You see, in Australia, light beer was alcohol light not calorie light. I am not sure it helped me anyway as I still managed to again 35 lbs in 6 months! But I guess it could have been worse! And the 3 years drinking practice from 18-21 years kept me in good stead to not get drunk on beer. But the Bacardi 151 is another story…

I realised that Mr Buffet must have been busy with all the investing, charity and philanthropy, so I did think it strange that he had time to sing about sunshine and margaritas! Well, who knew that he didn’t summer in Omaha and winter in Key West but was actually TWO people? And did you know that Warren Buffett and Jimmy Buffett are not even related?

Just about on a daily basis I think of something worthy of posting on this blog. I think ‘that was dumb’, I should put that on my blog! In my head I write the entry, edit it, laugh and file it away for when I next get to sit at the computer. Then I promptly forget about it. So the next time I go to blog, I think ‘What was that story I was going to write?’ I keep forgetting the stories to blog!

I think I must file the entries with all those checkbooks, odd socks, sunglasses and pens that I seem to misplace so often!

A lawyer and a blonde woman are sitting next to each other on a long flight. The lawyer asks if she would like to play a fun game. The blonde is tired and just wants to take a nap, so she politely declines and tries to catch a few winks.

The lawyer persists, that the game is a lot of fun. “I ask you a question, and if you don’t know the answer, you pay me only $5. You ask me one, and if I don’t know the answer, I will pay you $500.

This catches the blonde’s attention; and, to keep him quiet, she agrees to play the game. The lawyer asks the first question. “What’s the distance from the earth to the moon?” The blonde doesn’t say a word, reaches in to her purse, pulls out a five-dollar bill, and hands it to the lawyer.

Now, it’s the blonde’s turn. She asks the lawyer, “What goes up a hill with three legs, and comes down with four?” The lawyer uses his laptop, searches all references. He uses the Air phone; he searches the Net and even the Library of Congress. He sends e-mails to all of the smart friends he knows, all to no avail.

After one hour of searching he finally gives up. He wakes up the blonde and hands her $500. The blonde takes the $500 and goes back to sleep.

The lawyer is going nuts not knowing the answer. He wakes her up and asks, “Well, so what goes up a hill with three legs and comes down with four?”

The blonde reaches into her purse, hands the lawyer $5 and goes back to sleep.

please stand up?

So I am not sure who is more to blame for my latest geographical embarrassment - my husband for the lousy directions or me for thinking that the directions he gave would be sufficiently detailed to have me arrive on time at the destination without detour! A quick stop at the Alabama Tourist Information Bureau on the way from Niceville to Pensacola was in order, and a 13 mile detour just to turn around (closest median break for lost souls such as me!) I finally arrived at my destination only an hour late with a passport stamp from Alabama.

So life had been getting me down lately and I kept saying something has to change! I used to be a ‘glass half full’ kind of person but more recently I had become a ‘glass half empty’ one.

Then a kind friend reminded me that it is just the wrong size glass!

“Nighty night.. sleep tight” refers to when bed base used rope netting under the mattress, which had to be pulled taught each night.

Why is it that men need sex to believe that everything in the world is okay… yet women need everything in the world to be okay to want sex?