Christmas Spirit ~~

I saw this tonight and it touched me.  It needs no written words, it’s just something that bears repeating for our hearts.

                                                                  

CHRISTMAS SPIRIT                                  

Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow ~~

No, I have no news whatsoever. I am just enjoying today for what it is, a Snow Day.  It is still as exciting to me as when I was a kid and school was either closed or we went home early due to that wonderful winter word, snow.

This morning I got up extra early just to watch the beginning of the snow falling and at 9:15 it started. Gorgeous. The report says 6” but I have my doubts since our loved but almost always wrong forecasters probably won’t be any different this time. That’s ok, this is wonderful just as it is.  I made my plans in advance yesterday, headed to the store (not for bread and milk, oh pleasssseee) and stocked up on cat food just in case I was really snowed in for days. Hey, I can do without but I’d never make the “kids” do without. The grocery store was packed as expected. When it snows, I have this craving for chili cheese dip, lots of jalapenos, oh yummm, so I planned to buy the ingredients for that, the cat food as already said, and then regular stuff that falls into the category of good-for-you. Yes, I believe in being prepared. I lugged home the loot and stored it away, got out a container from the freezer of that unbelievably good turkey soup I’d made, and waited for today. I swear, it was like being a kid and waiting for Christmas Eve and the sound of hooves on the roof.  I barely slept a wink and got up at the crack of dawn. My dreams were realized and I was grinnin’ ear to ear. Breakfast was early and coffee, too.  Then when 1:00 rolled around, I was really craving that chili cheese dip. Unreal.  I forgot to buy the ingredients. At this moment as I type, I still feel like the world has come to an early end, but I’ll get over it.  The scent of that soup is wafting up the steps and I’m heading down to scoop up a bowl – still, it’s not the dip, darn it.

I took a few shots of the outside as the snow was coming down, and I made a little vid of the front, but as usual, my vids go all over the place.  I made one of the birds in the back yard, too, but good lord, I must have hit the button at the wrong moment a dozen times and never got a complete vid….deleted the crummy thing.  Anyway, here’s my day, including a new picture of Sam since I hadn’t updated one of him for a bit and a new one of me, too, for what it’s worth ;)  As usual, click to enlarge if you’d like.  I really didn’t have much to say today, it was more a snow feeling than anything.

     

  

Here’s hoping if you have snow, you’re enjoying it just as much

Here’s the little vid. It’s not even close to what it should be, but gosh, when you get a whim and the snow is just that minute coming down, tell me, just how do you go about making a perfectly done vid?  It’s shakey as usual and disjointed, too, but I don’t care.  It will always remind me of today, and today will never come again.

XOXOXO

A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words ~~

First, let me say right up front, there will be no photos on this entry, not a one. Why? Because this story is not only true but…let me tell you what happened.

There is a gal that’s been a dear friend of mine since elementary school, and being that I’m 63, that’s a long, long time. She is smart, she is beautiful, she is loving and honest, and she adores pets, especially cats.  Her very grown daughter lives in NY and travels so much that she hasn’t had enough time to spend with her sweet cat, so she called my friend (her mother) and asked if she would be willing to take the cat.  My friend without any hesitation said of course!  The cat traveled 1400 miles to his new home and was delighted to be with a human that was home all the time just for him (at least that’s how the cat saw it). My friend was just as delighted and couldn’t wait to call me and tell me all about him. Then she started taking pictures just like any new mom would do -- pictures of the cat walking, eating, sleeping, blurred pictures, and sharp pictures. When she told me about how he had taken to sleeping in the bathroom sink, that wasn’t so much of a surprise to me since I’d had any number of cats that loved it.  She said she’d taken this great close up shot of him in the sink and for me to notice how much he looked like my Lucy and so she emailed the photo to me.  I looked at it and yes indeed, he did look like my Lucy. I didn’t think any more about that picture until today. I wondered if the markings on his face were like Lucy’s, so I opened the photo on my desktop and clicked once to enlarge it.  I looked at his face, I squinted, I pulled back and looked, and leaned in and looked again.  As I was trying to find a particular “look” about him, all of a sudden my eyeballs went ZOINGGGGGGG!  What was this? What made me say OMG out loud?  What had all along appeared to be a shadow in the corner third of the picture was my friend, in the altogether from the belly button to the middle of her thighs, taking that picture with her camera phone right in front of the mirror. Well, I started laughing so hard I almost choked!  Immediately I called her and asked her to look at that photo. She said what was she supposed to be looking for and I said, “Don’t you see it? Don’t you see something terribly wrong with this picture?” She said no and then added, “Let me click on it. I’m looking at the thumbnail”.  The next thing I heard was a scream and an OH MY GODDDDDDDDD!  I could hardly breathe for laughing by now.  She asked how she could have ever missed that and then in this terrible rushed voice said, “Hold on a minute!”  Barely an instant went by and she said, “Oh thank goodness! I just deleted it off my Face Book!”  Will I ever get off this floor from laughing so hard. Ohhhh, my sides are killin’ me!

Now I know I shouldn’t be telling on her like that, but I never showed the photo, and I never said her name, so how could anyone pass up a story like that!?  Priceless. Just priceless.

Going, GOing, GONE! ~~

I am still amazed at what happened last night!  I got into this auction on bidmacs knowing I never win anything. Bidmacs is very different from an eBay auction.  With eBay as you know, most (not all) products are used or if new, the prices really aren’t that far off of retail.  Bidmacs only deals with brand new items, still in the manufacturers packaging, and still with all warranty info inside the box so that you can register whatever the item is that you won.  Here’s how the bidding works. You first have to buy a package of “bids” and there are a number of packages you can choose from.  Then once you have your package, that number of bids shows on your page to let you know how many times you can click on “bid now” for a particular item up for sale. Each bid is 1 CENT and raises the bid by a penny only.  These are called penny auctions. Once you get a good feel for them, you can win brand new items dirt cheap. The idea behind it is to win the bid by being the last to bid as the clock hits 0. Should someone click bid now at 1 sec left or anything above that, then the clock returns to 20 seconds to go.  Since each bid only ups the price by 1 penny, this bidding can go on a longgggg time. 

Last night, in one of my regular sleepless times with a what-can-I-do-with-myself-now mode, I logged on to Bidmacs and saw this laptop up for grabs. I thought since I had bids left to work with, I’d go ahead and have some fun. Holy cow, I won! I sat there with my mouth hanging open when I saw the red flag go up saying Bidding Closed, Won by JennyD.  I just couldn’t believe my eyes!  I never win anything.  But this is the most amazing part of all:  It is an HP ProBook 4420s with a retail of $600, and I won it with a bid of……..Ta-Dahhhhh, drum roll, $27.13.  Hewlett Packard mails it to you themselves and there’s not even any shipping and handling.  Incredible.  Here’s what it looks like:

                                            

Now this isn’t even the end of the story.  I went to the page to pay my $27.13 and finished with that.  Then I went back to the main page to see what else was up for bidding (yes, completely awake by now).  Bidding was going strong on about 12-15 items at a time, even including LCD big TV’s.  I saw someone win a 42” LCD TV for under $10.  And remember, everything is brand new, not refurbished.  Well, all of a sudden I saw this other little laptop thing called a Lenovo IdeaPad.  I googled it and found out it’s like a little regular laptop of only 10 inches, but it does something else, too.  If you want to turn it into a reader such as a Kindle or a Nook, the top swivels around and then slides over top of the keypad so that you are now only seeing the screen.  You can read a book vertically, or with the flip of a wrist, change to horizontally and immediately the entire format of that book goes to horizontal with you!  I swear, what will they think of next!   Here’s what that little gizmo looks like:

                                              

                                              

See how it will swivel and then change to a pad?  I think that’s ingenious.  So the bidding is going on and I’m starting to salivate. Holy cow, I won again!  Now this little thing doesn’t retail for as much as the HP, but still, the retail was $250.  My winning bid and what I had to pay for it was….drum roll again….$10.61 !  It even comes bundled with Windows 7 and a bunch of other stuff. Wow.  And I just want it as a reader, lol.   What a night of miracles it was.  Two big wins for a total of $37.74  

I am still shaking my head in wonder and I haven’t closed my mouth YET.  Both will be here in about 2 weeks and then all I have to do is find someone to show me how to use a laptop, LOL.   I’ve never used one in my life!  I’m so excited

That is my news for now. It’s 10:35am and I need to get a move-on for the day and get back to reality. It sure was good catching up with everyone and hearing what’s been going on.  I’ll be making Carole’s chicken recipe this weekend IF I can fit through the kitchen door after all of Beth’s Christmas goodies. What great friends, eh? 

XOXOXO