Friday Follow #10

Woo Hoo! Another Friday Follow!
Hosted by One 2 Try, Hearts Make Families and Midday Escapades!

You know the way to play. Grab the buttons, add your blog to the MckLinky, & follow back if you get a new follower.
It's a great way to find new blogs, meet really nice people, and maybe gain a few followers!

This week's wonderful sponsor is Bea’s Gift Baskets.com

Bummer!

While doing some Googling, I found that my home town of Mufreesboro NC changed the library from here:


{Historic Roberts-Vaughan House}


To here:

{Elizabeth S. Parker Memorial Library}

While I acknowledge that The Elizabeth S. Parker Memorial Library looks larger, especially as the Roberts-Vaughan House was only half-used as a library, but still. Bummer. I checked out my first Stephen King book from that library. My mother signed a paper stating I could check out any book I wanted. I was 11. I must have checked out thousands of books from the Roberts-Vaughan House. It was literally the best organized library I've ever been in. They had the fiction organized by genre. Cool. Libraries I have been in up North do not do that. :(
It's just kind of a bummer.
(I type House slightly sarcastically, as that is another aspect of it that has changed. It used to be the Roberts-Vaughan Center. )

A Question of Ethics

Jennifer from J. Leigh Designz received this email:

"I really don't think its fair that you enter contests when you can easily blog things. you should step aside and let regular people win these contests. I would hope that other bloggers wouldn't chose you if you were to win."

You can read her post here.

Now, personally, I have no problem with review/giveaway bloggers entering contests. Seriously, the entries would go way down if they didn't.
In my comment I flat out stated that some bloggers (very, very few) cheat.
Her response was:
"Oh I wasn't implying they cheat. I've seen many of my readers win on the sites in mind. I just wondered if maybe they didn't pick fellow review bloggers."

Here's my opinion on that subject. If you state that you will choose a number at random, then that is exactly what you should do. Your first number stands & IS the winner. (Except in the case of the original winner not following the rules; that's a different thing entirely) You don't get pick again because you don't like that entrant or because that person has won on your site recently or because that person is a fellow review blogger. The ONLY reason to push that button (or draw another name out of the hat or count the number of licks to the center of a Tootsie Roll Tootsie Pop, however you randomly choose) is if the first winner didn't follow the rules. Otherwise, it isn't random. It's picking & choosing.
And if you're going to do it that way, be honest. Say, I'm just going to choose whomever I feel like letting win today.
What do you think? Is it cheating to choose again?

So Not Cool & Friday Follow

It was time to take the little rat, er, I mean dog out to do his nightly business when I see one of the feral cats that live in my neighborhood walking along the side of my house. I thought to myself, gee that's an ugly cat. Big, too.

This is what he looked like:

Yeah, I know. It's an opossum. I'm a genius sometimes. Luckily the wee dog was on his leash & we hadn't gone off the porch before I realized, not a cat.
So now I have an opossum under my house.
In case you're curious, opossums are not that afraid of people.
They do not have cuddly personalities.
Their diets are kinda gross.
He is going to have to go. Go back to whatever woodland Utopia he waddled away from to take up residence under my house. He can not stay.
Did I mention he was huge?
Yeah.
He has to go.

And now on to Friday Follow!


Welcome to Friday Follow, hosted by One 2 Try, Hearts Make Families and Midday Escapades!
You know how this works. Grab the button, link your blog, and follow back when you get a new follower. This week there's a sponsor, so grab that button too & help keep Friday Follow rolling. It's a great way to meet new people, find interesting blogs to follow, & maybe even gain a few followers yourself!



Have fun!

Oh, and do not fear for the incredibly large marsupial that has taken up residence under my residence. I don't believe in slaughtering animals merely because of their uncomfortable proximity to human habitation. If he doesn't mosey on down the road on his own, he'll be live-trapped & relocated to a place where he is less likely to be damaged or do damage.

CSNStore.com Children's Bookshelf

I have a giveaway up for a children's bookshelf here.
Take a chance & enter. Someone has to win & it could be you!

My Wish For You Today

Moo!!!!

I'm not very happy with myself right now. In May of 2009, after 8 months of keeping off the 37 pounds I had spent 6 months loosing, I was 13 pounds away from my optimum weight. I put on & zipped up a pair of jeans I bought when I was 13. OK, to be fair I couldn't sit down in them. Or, you know, breath, but the fact is, they were on & zipped! I gave away all of my fat clothes. I didn't need them anymore. I went clothes shopping. For myself.
Fast forward to now. I've regained all but 7 of the pounds I lost. So now I'm back to needing to loose 43 pounds. 43 POUNDS!!!
The really pathetic part is, I know how to loose weight. I know how to keep it off. But I got lazy. It really is just that simple. I step on the scale & think, oh, it's only a pound. Oh, It's only five pounds. It creeps up on you. I stopped walking 15,000 steps a day & settled for 10,000. Then it was 7500. Some days I'm only getting 5000.
This sucks. Really.
But fortunately, I know how to do this. I need to watch what I eat. I need to take 15,000 steps a day. And I need to drink more water.
At 1500 Calories + 15,000 steps + 150 ounces of water a day, I lost 30 pounds in eight weeks in 2 years ago. My weight loss slowed down after that, but I still lost pretty consistently. I can do that again. I will loose this weight.

Small Change

I changed my colors around a bit. I hope this is easier on every one's eyes.

Friday Follow Week #8

Welcome to the Eighth Friday Follow celebration hosted by One 2 Try, Hearts Make Families and Midday Escapades! We invite you to join us every Friday to get more blog followers and to follow other interesting blogs. It is all about sharing and having fun.

Here's how YOU can join the celebration:

• * Link up your blog name and URL using the MckLinky below. Only need to add on one blog to be seen on all the blog hops.
• * Follow the Friday Follow hostesses listed in the first 3 slots.
• * Follow as many blogs as you like
• * Comment on the blogs telling them you're from Friday Follow
• * Follow back when you get a new follower through Friday Follow

Welcome Friday Followers!

Just A Few Things

1. If your computer was acting wonky today, it may not have been your computer. Google/Blogger has been having issues all day. After some research, they may have done some kind of "upgrade" last night/this morning. Slow loads, timing out, and site not found (not to mention missing widgets) are all problems I encountered today. I'm not the only one, as I read plenty of posts complaining of these same troubles. Seems to be working better now.

2. I am amazed at the number of bloggers who do not have a button. Not even "new" bloggers, but well-established, been around a while bloggers. If you would like a button, email me (gevin13{at}gmail{dot}com) & we'll see if we can work together to make you one.

3. If you do have a button & it isn't on my sidebar yet, I will get around to it. I have been sick this past week & still am, so haven't been getting as much done as I would like. I will catch up this weekend, I hope.

Oh, The Weather Outside Is Frightful

My Dad sent me these pictures. He lives about 6 miles down the road from me. Isn't Northwestern PA weather lovely? Friday was a snow day & Mohawk Man got to stay home & irritate his little sister all day long. The snow was so high on Saturday, we literally could not push open the back door. Things are starting to melt off, thankfully. Still, it's only March, so another month of random snow (at the least) and another 2 months of fairly chilly nights (and days).
My nephew gave me a cold. I've been sleeping away most of my weekend & have every intention of sleeping away as much of Monday as I can get away with. I was actually awake for a few hours last night. Sneezing, coughing, sinuses feel like they're filled with 15 pounds of cement, and Hubby says, "Here, read this."
It's an article in the newspaper about how people are going to the emergency room with flu-like symptoms. Only it's not the flu, it's a cold. A really bad, mega, virus-on-steroids cold. You know, sorta like I have? This particular cold is worse than & will last longer than a regular cold. Gee, thanks honey. I really needed to read that right now.