Mishmash Musings

I had my monthly orthodontist appointment his morning, and I am in some major pain right now. I was actually looking forward to this session because I was going to get my expander removed (after having it in for almost a whole year). That did in fact happen, and now I have a simple bar attachment in place to keep my upper molars in place.

But what I wasn’t counting on was having my archwire changed to something significantly thicker. There was an immediate increase in pressure when my dentist put the wire in, and then to make things worse, he’s keeping the archwire in place with more wire, instead of just elastic. That’s right, I’ve got wire around each bracket now, and the pain is just incredible!

I’m coming up on my one-year anniversary for having braces on both my top and bottom teeth, and while I can definitely see some improvements, I can also see that I still have a very long way to go.

Sigh. I am soooo ready for this to be over with .

As someone who shops online quite a bit, I can tell you that the best way to get me back to a web retailer for additional purchases is to offer me some kind of incentive. Let’s face it: these days, most online stores offer equivalent prices and services (such as free shipping), so from a consumer standpoint, it all comes down to incentives. For example, I’m much more likely to buy something from a particular website if they offer me, say, 25% off my purchase. Otherwise, I don’t really care where I spend my money.

So if you run an online retail site, don’t you think it would be smart to provide incentives to your customers? If you’re looking to do so, you should check out the services offered by webloyalty, a leading online marketer. They can help you promote customer loyalty by putting together an incentive package (such as coupons or free access to valuable services for a limited time) that will help make shopping at your website more attractive to consumers.

Webloyalty has helped many major companies develop a more loyal customer base, so check out their site today to see what they can do for you!

I had a pretty restless night and didn’t get much sleep. After spending about an hour and a half just lying in the dark trying to nod off, I gave up and decided to go online to pass the time. But that didn’t help much at all because the Internet is pretty much a dead zone from 2am-5am or so. I mean, there was no action on any of the message boards that I frequent, and there were hardly any people in the Yahoo game rooms either. No new blog posts, twitter updates, or anything of the kind. Just a total dead zone!

I spent most of the day just cleaning the house. We’d been letting things go because of the holidays and shopping, so the whole place was messier than usual and I just couldn’t stand it anymore.

I did several loads of laundry, vacuumed every single room, mopped the kitchen floors, scrubbed the toilets and showers, and dusted everywhere. I even took some time to clean off my office furniture, which was necessary because I had several weeks worth of mail and paperwork piled on my desk and filing cabinets.

Now I’m too tired to cook dinner, so I think we’ll just order a pizza after my husband comes home. Then I’m going to unwind with a few DVDs to watch and a bottle of Heineken before hitting the sack early tonight.

I’ve got another busy day tomorrow, what with organizing my family photos, an ortho appointment, and writing out Christmas cards, so I’m glad I was able to get all this cleaning done today!

Well, as of the end of business today there’s been no real movement one way or the other in the WGA strike. Television and movie writers are reportedly asking studios to grant them a 2.5% share of revenue earned from DVD sales and Internet broadcasts of their work. Yes, we’re talking about two and a half cents per dollar. But the studios apparently aren’t budging on this.

I just read an AP article yesterday saying that most TV shows are nearing the end of airing the episodes they filmed before the strike hit. That means if there’s no resolution soon, all of these shows will be stuck in rerun hell for who knows how long. Here are the fates of some of my favorites:

House: The episode that aired tonight will be the final one until January (this was a scheduled hiatus), at which point the producers only have three more new eps in the can.

CSI and Cold Case: Both of these shows reportedly have “four or fewer” new episodes left.

Desperate Housewives: Just one new episode left, which is scheduled to air on Sunday.

How I Met Your Mother: No new episodes left, so only repeats will be aired until the strike resolves.

I don’t really care about HIMYM or DH, but I just love Cold Case and House, and don’t want to go too long without new eps. So… hopefully the strike ends soon!

When I was in my early twenties and just starting to live on my own for the first time, I often had trouble making ends meet. I was living paycheck to paycheck, and sometimes needed a bit of help to cover bills that fell due before I got paid. On those occasions, I took out a few payday loans to tide me over.

I remember what a hassle it was back then to apply for (and receive) a payday loan. I had to fill out the paperwork, fax it– along with copies of all my IDs and pay stubs — to the loan office, and then wait for the approval to come back via fax. Since I had no way of knowing when that would be, I had to keep checking in at Kinko’s every few hours. What a headache!

These days, however, the process is a lot simpler. First of all, places like Payday Loan Rescue now specialize in no fax payday loans, where they collect your information online instead. This means you can apply from the comfort of your own home and not have to worry about hanging around a fax machine waiting for an answer. Second, approvals and loan offers are likely to come much faster since everything is handled online. This is great news when you’re agonizing over the ability to pay bills.

If you find yourself in need of some extra cash until your next paycheck comes in, you might want to apply for a payday loan at paydayloanrescue.com today. I think you’ll be surprised at just how easy it is to get the money you need!

I just read an article saying that the consumption of unrefined carbohydrates, such as those found in white rice and bread, increases the risk of diabetes in black and Chinese women. The article then went on to talk about the glycemic index, and how certain foods can spike the body’s blood sugar level, which in turn compromises the body’s ability to use insulin. (I would link to the article here, but I found it on Yahoo, which means the link will be dead in a couple months, so I’m not even going to bother.)

Anyway, this could be huge news, particularly since rice is a main food staple of Chinese women. Given that China is home to 20% of the world’s population, this could mean that we could see significant health ramifications in the not-too-distant future. At least — that’s what the article would have you believe.

I’m withholding judgment on this one, as Chinese women have been subsisting on rice for how many centuries now? If there hasn’t been a severe problem with diabetes in that country up til now, then what makes anyone think the situation will change in the near futrue?

My family has a very limited entertainment budget, so we’re always looking for free things to do on the weekends. But honestly, it’s becoming increasingly more difficult to find interesting events that offer free admission to adults and children alike. As a result, we often end up just going to the library for books, to the mall for window shopping, or to the video store for a couple of DVDs. However, that routine gets old pretty quickly.

That’s why I wish we had something like the St. Augustine Artwalk around here. On the first Friday (and Saturday) of every month from 5-9 pm, visitors can enjoy art exhibitions music, entertainment, and refreshments at more than 20 of the cities leading galleries. Admission is completely free, plus patrons can also ride sightseeing trains and trolleys between destinations for free as well.

The exhibits feature some of St. Augustine’s most prominent artists, including Beau Redmond, Ray Brilli, Jan Miller, Trip Harrison, Jean Troemel, Peter O’Neill, and Sydney McKenna, whose works run the gamut from architecture to painting and photography.

The First Friday Weekend Art Walk sounds like a tremendous event not only for art enthusiasts, but also for anyone looking for something different to do for a change of pace. I really envy anyone who gets a chance to attend because I think all of those exhibits sound like they would be neat to view!

The next ArtWalk will be held on December 7, and the event will continue on every first Friday of 2008.

If you need more details, such as phone numbers, trolley pickup spots, and things like that, you can check out the official site for more details. Be sure to take advantage of these FREE events and show your support for St. Augustine culture!

It’s been years since I’ve printed out any family photos to put in albums. I have gotten so lazy about keeping up with things like this that it’s not even funny anymore. I mean, I have about four years worth of pictures on my husband’s computer that I have to sort through, and I want to get this done soon.

My son loves looking through photo albums, but we haven’t put one together since he was a baby. I need to go through our pictures year by year, pick out about 30-40 good ones from birthday parties, Christmas, family get-togethers, vacations, or whatever from each year, and then slap them into four separate photo albums.

I’m designating this task as my project of the week. I hope to at least sort through the computer files and earmark a bunch of pictures for printing by Friday. After that, I’ll give myself a couple of days to take the files to Wal-Mart or something to get printed, buy photo albums, etc.

I should be able to get this done within the next week if I start right now!

One of my goals for this year was to start investing my money instead of just letting it sit around in a savings account earning a minuscule interest rate. I partially followed through on this idea by buying into a money market fund, but I didn’t get nearly the kind of return I was expecting. So for next year, I’m going to ramp up my efforts and really make investing money (rather than just saving it) a priority.

Since we have just about 5 weeks left in the year, I figured this would be a good time to start researching potential investment vehicles. I’ve heard that gold investing is a relatively safe way to go, since gold appreciates in value more often than not. This makes investing in gold coins, bars, or ingots a smart move that can pay off big in the future.

I admit that I’ve suffered from “over-analysis paralysis” in the past, meaning that I put so much research and thought into a decision that I never actually take any action. I’m not going to let that happen anymore, though. It’s time to get moving on this plan!

I sometimes have a book queue planned out, where I have a list of the next 3-5 books that I want to read. But more often than not, I finish a novel without having a clue as to what to pick up next. It usually takes me forever to come up with a decent selection, so I’m glad I stumbled upon a site called whatshouldireadnext.com.

At this site, you enter the title and author of a book that you liked, and your query will return a list of suggested reading from titles in their database. The database is more or less user-generated, so you’re basically just getting targeted selections from other readers, but I still think it’s a nifty idea.

I tested it out with a few titles just to see what the suggestions would be like. I thought most of the recommended titles were somewhat related, but a few were totally out there, so this obviously isn’t the most scientific approach around.

Anyway, it’s a site worth checking out if you have a minute!

We’re planning to take a family vacation in late January or early February of ‘08, so we’re kicking around some destination ideas right now. I’d love to travel overseas, but I don’t think my husband will be able to take enough time off from work. That means we’ll likely head to Orlando, SoCal, or one of our other favorite vacation spots right here in the States.

No matter where we end up going, one of our goals is to travel smarter. We’ve been slacking in the pre-trip research department lately, so our last two trips haven’t gone as smoothly as they could have. On one of our adventures, we ended up paying $250 per night for our hotel room (in St. Louis, of all places) because we didn’t book early enough. On another one, we ended up staying in a total dump of a hotel (because we didn’t check the place out beforehand), and that ruined the trip for everyone.

In addition to research, we’re thinking about maybe getting some travel insurance before we go. You never can tell what’s going to happen when you’re away from home, so it’s far better to be safe than sorry.

Anyway, we’ve still got a couple of months to get everything worked out. Hopefully we’ll be completely prepared for this next vacation!