Miscellaneous of the past week

1.  This morning I turned on a tv that was tuned to HGTV from yesterday afternoon. Cash in the Attic, a show I've never seen before, was showing. An couple in the late 50 or early 60s with a daughter in her early 20s (I'm guessing on all the ages) wanted to raise $3000 for a hot tub. The show came in and went through their stuff to see if they could probably get the money at auction. It's probably my personality, but I was surprised to see people visibly upset about selling something that had meaning to them for a HOT TUB!!!

It certainly seemed ridiculous to me to sacrifice what you value for something so temporal. Their house was average to nice which means they had to have had some money so I thought, "Save the money for a few months and then just buy a hot tub."

Then at the end of the show the family is circled around the hot tub. The mother puts her hands in the water and says, "It has jets." That explained it all why they did the show!

2. Friday night a man down the street rang my doorbell. A friend had parked in the elderly lady next door's driveway which is shared with mine. My friend got to my house before I did and she wanted to leave the way open for me to go in the garage. I should have had her move her vehicle or called my neighbor to explain but I did neither. My neighbor tried calling me to ask about the car in her driveway as she was afraid to go to bed, but my phone was on vibrate in another room so I never heard it. Totally agreed that a car in the driveway would be unnerving no matter how old you are when you are ready to go to bed. She called the neighbor man who came and asked me about it. I called the neighbor and explained everything.

Obviously I felt bad about the situation so yesterday I made oatmeal cookies to give to both neighbors. When I stopped at the man's house, I was talking with his wife. He walked in the room and she explained that I had brought cookies for his inconvenience coming over last Friday night.

His reply: "Hey, I can come over tonight too if it means more cookies!"

3. One of my responsibilities since last summer is ordering supplies for about 50 people. I decided there was too much junk in the drawers that needed to be cleaned out. Not knowing for sure what people do use I put anything I thought we no longer needed on a counter and gave people an opportunity to let me know if they still used any of the stuff.

I sent out an e-mail that began with, "If you need labels for your 3.5" floppy disks we have about 150 of them from the supply drawers." Now, in any other area I'm sure people would have responded with the joke of floppy disks since no one has used those in how many years??? But I work in finance and not only did no one comment about my joke, at least one person took me seriously!

Parenthood

Last night while finishing some work and getting ready for bed I had the tv show Parenthood on in the background. I don't watch this show but have found some of the previews funny.

I was surprised to see two parents showing some real backbone with their daughter. Apparently she is 16 dating a 19-year old recovering alcholic, food bank worker of a different race. The parents have forbidden her to see him because of his age and background. She of course doesn't let him know that so he shows up one day to go out. There is a an exchange and the father tells him to leave.

Give the guy a lot of credit: he gets mad at the girl for lying to him when he's trying to be honest to others and himself. He even visits the father at work to let the father know he didn't knowingly violate the parents wishes.

The father told the boy something like this:  Haddie is 16 and you are 19. She has the rest of her life to deal with adult issues, but right now we just want her to be a 16-year old as long as she can.

Wow, that showed a lot of love for the child and not hate for the boy.

I don't know how the show ended as I was asleep, but as a non-parent I found it refreshing to see parents set guidelines for their child and then follow through when those lines are crossed.

Extreme Home Makeover

Sunday, November 8 watch Extreme Makeover Home Edition. It's on ABC at 8:00 pm. Eastern. Last winter I met the father at a wheelchair basketball tournament. The coach of the team is the former girls basketball coach of the school I was at in Ohio. He and his wife are friends of mine.

The Terpenning family's father is the last Vietnamese orphan airlifted in the 70s. He had polio, and in addition to his own health issues has taken on the care of his younger brother as well.

Great story, great family. Catch the show if you can, and let me know what you think.

Jon and Kate Plus 8

Last night I was channel surfing for a few minutes before going to bed and came across Jon and Kate Plus 8. Based on the positive reviews of the show I’d read on a family blog I settled on it. While overall it was good, I think the reviewers should have warned a newbie to the show to only watch one or at the most two shows in succession. Last night there were several episodes on in a row. The first was cute with the parents taking each child on a special day—one of the twins was roller skating and then out to lunch with the parents.

I probably should have stopped there, but the next episode was the parents taking the other twin, Maddie ???, to get her ears pierced and out to Red Robin. That little girl could get on one’s nerves very quickly, but it was cute to see her enjoy lunch with just her parents.

By this time I was in bed and trying to go to sleep. The next episode was on the plane flying to Utah. It was a nightmare waiting to happen. No wonder I was awake during the night! I wish you loyal viewers would have warned me of how frayed my nerves would be after watching it!

I also think this should be mandatory watching for high schoolers to avoid teen pregnancy!

Anyway, I enjoyed it and will watch again in limited doses thanks to the recommendations from family.