Friday, April 30, 2010

A Crazy Little Thing Called Blog: #10 More Questions


It's been a while since I posted about the ins and outs of blogging. While I'm in Ohio visiting family, I thought I'd ask a few questions I'm wrestling with and see if you have some answers-- Or questions of your own.

Here are my questions:

1) My sidebar-- I use Blogger. When I try to move the various gadgets around (via drag and drop) on my sidebar, they won't "stick".... they jump around and "land" in random places on the sidebar. Is there a trick to lining the gadgets up the way I want them???

2) When I'm at home on my Mac I have no problem typing a New Post, but, when I log into Blogger on a PC, my font changes to Chinese. I have no idea why. Note: I can comment in English, I just can't write Posts. Any clues why???

How about you? Any blogging questions that have been bugging you? Leave your question in the comment box and we'll see if we can get some answers.

Thanks a million. I'll be back Tuesday to catch up with you all.
Welcome to www.TheFiftyFactor.com - Joanna Jenkins
For more Blogging answers and Q&As Click HERE
Photo Credit: Jeff Metzger

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

I Surrender

You've heard me rant about Beloved Husband's annoying Blackberry-- the one that is never "off". And, I've gone on the record numerous times vowing not to be "plugged in", connected or online 24/7 ever again. I even refuse to Tweet and deleted my Facebook account (completely), although I rarely ever looked at it.

I remember vividly the day-- nearly three years ago, when I danced a happy dance after canceling my Blackberry account after I retired thus no longer being connected to my email-- and clients-- non-stop. It was a thrill that still makes me smile.

My clients were great but I was not all that crazy about them emailing requests at midnight or when my Blackberry would buzz at some ungodly hour in the U.S. when it was daytime overseas. To me, retirement meant not having to constantly check my email. Ahhhh, it was paradise.

For a while.

Since those initial fabulous months of peace and quiet, "social networking" exploded and it appears, if I ever want to be in touch with my family again, I need to get back on the bandwagon and get connected, otherwise their lives will pass me by.

So I did it, gawd help me-- I bought an iPhone. Yes, my husband smirked as I sheepishly showed him my new gadget while I "ate crow" about being joined at the hip to the World Wide Web again. He's rather enjoying the teasing, I might add.

When I sent my first text to my niece it was easy to see she was laughing as she responded with a "welcome to the real world" message. Now the younger generation in my family is waiting for my Twitter name and continue to remind me of all the family pictures I'm missing without a Facebook account. But, the flurry of text messages from them congratulating me on my newest acquisition has been a nice way of keeping in touch, even if I have no idea what most of the abbreviations they're using mean.... yet.

What pushed me over the edge and into the Apple Store yesterday? I'm heading back home to Ohio on Wednesday for the week and my arthritic hands are too sore to schlep my laptop along plus um*well*ahem*cough*I*hate*to*admit*it*dang* the idea of using my folks painfully slow dial-up connection and ten year old computer to check emails exhausted me just thinking about it.

So I bit the bullet and jumped back in with a shiny new white iPhone with a candy apple red case and not a clue how to use all the features it claims to offer. I'll take an Apple class when I return for the stuff the kids in Ohio can't teach me. But in the meantime, the nice teenage (or at least he looked like one) salesman at the store hooked me up so I can easily check my email, bless his heart. Oh, and he taught me how to actually answer the phone too.

I won't be around much this next week but I'll be reading blogs on my iPhone.

Have a great week and happy social networking. (Ugh, I can't believe I'm saying that.)
Welcome to www.TheFiftyFactor.com - Joanna Jenkins

Sunday, April 25, 2010

Sundays In My City #32 - One Year Later....

Unknown Mami hosts a great Sunday theme inviting YOU to get out and take pictures of your city and/or Sunday to share with the rest of blogland. Click HERE to see Unknown Mami's Sunday in her City today.

I told you about my brother and his bride who skipped off to Las Vegas for a beautiful and romantic wedding-- that my Beloved and I crashed. You can read about it HERE.

On the eve of their one year anniversary, I thought I'd flashback and show you a couple of pics from my Sunday a year ago.

We met up with them here-- At the Wynn, a fab hotel that treated them like a King and Queen....

It's right next door to their sister hotel, Encore, that has lots of delicate mosaics to enjoy....

The Bride was absolutely stunning and the Groom was pretty darn handsome, if I do say so myself....

We rode in a huge stretch limo way out of town to a park with views as far as the eye could see...

No, we didn't make them walk back to the hotel we rode in the limo again. And when we got back to the hotel they were....

Happy One Year Anniversary to my Brother and Sister-in-Law!

How's your Sunday?
Welcome to www.TheFiftyFactor.com - Joanna Jenkins
Photo Credit: Joanna Jenkins
Be sure to check out the other Sundays In My City participants-- Or better yet, show us YOUR Sunday/City. Click here.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Silence


Ahh, the sound of blissful silence. What more could a girl ask for?

After eight weeks of head-banging noise, starting at 7am sharp, today I was greeted with silence and that can only mean one thing.....

The repairs on our sinking pool and deck are finally complete and every last contractor, jackhammer, table saw, rock pounder, air blower, vacuum cleaner, power drill, nail gun and slamming port-a-potty door have left the premises. In their place I swear I can hear angels singing!

Regular readers know this saga has been going on since last August, when out of the blue, our pool and deck decided to move south-- as in down hill for no apparent reason. For months we agonized over what to do, how to do it, and who to trust with such a major repair expense. The parade of characters and the proposals we received were enough to make this little girl scream-- which I did on a number of occasions, until my dream man entered the picture.

Mr. Bruno was an angel sent from heaven, or rather recommend by the delightful Thomas aka Mary Poppins, our project guru. As the on-site manager of the repair job, Mr. Bruno rode shotgun over all the workers, oversaw every detail and made sure our yard was spotless at the end of every day-- And I mean spotless! (The empty pool was vacuumed literally every single afternoon before the last guy left!)

For the better part of eight weeks, whenever I looked out the window into our yard, thanks to Mr. Bruno, all I saw were asses and elbows-- of guys working really hard and efficiently and amazingly neat. Despite, the early morning hours, the blaring construction noise and the OMG invoices we paid, at the end of it all, it was way less painful than I ever expected. And that is a dream come true.

There were no surprises, no "oophs", no mystery charges, no disasters (despite an earthquake in the middle of the repairs) and most important-- no drama! The job was done according to plan, on schedule (give or take a few rain days) and on budget. What a relief!

Of course I was hoping for some juicy blog fodder in the process. After all, some days I had a dozen men by my pool and food trucks lining up and down the street to feed them, but I'll take on-time and on-budget any day of the week in lieu of good blog gossip.

Now all that's left is to replant the flowers we moved into temporary pots so it looks like this again....

...And wait for the warm summer weather for our first pool party! Of course no one will ever notice the repair job since everything was put back to it's original place and condition, but when the lounge chairs are full of friends and family on the deck, I'll be confident no one will be going anywhere-- except to the buffet!

********

A very big and very late hug and shout out to Alix at Casa Hice for including me in her Blogger Buddy Award recognition. I'm an Alix groupie and never miss a post. If you don't know this amazing woman go check her out. You'll be really glad you did. Alix is a great friend, a true inspiration and one of my all time favorite reads.

This award requires I pass it on to ten Blog Buddies but you know me-- I hate to name names (except for Holly at Your Mother Knows But Won't Tell You-- I love Holly and I'm pretty sure she's how I found Alix in the first place.) So after Holly, I pass this on to the first nine commenters and all of you who would like to send some blog love to your favorite Blog Friends too.

Are you ready for summer?
Welcome to www.TheFiftyFactor.com - Joanna Jenkins

Photo Credit: (bumble bee) © smilewithjul - Fotolia.com

Saturday, April 17, 2010

Sundays In My City #31 - Puppy Love

Unknown Mami hosts a great Sunday theme inviting YOU to get out and take pictures of your city and/or Sunday to share with the rest of blogland. Click HERE to see Unknown Mami's Sunday in her City today.

For years I've been saying I can never get a dog or cat. My reason is simple-- I know, without a doubt, I'd become the crazy dog or cat lady in a New York second. You know what I'm talking about-- One of those peeps who talks baby talk to their pooch or carries their cat in a Louis Vuitton bag. Yup, I would so go there.

Not having a pet never bothered me-- That is until I met this little guy last week....

Nine month old Noah belongs to my folks in Ohio. It was all I could do not to smuggle him out of their house and onto the plane with me back to Los Angeles.

He's trained beautifully and full of love and sweetness and I came this close to dog-napping him.

The good news is, I'm heading back to Ohio in ten days for my sweet niece's baby shower-- So I can rethink my doggie desire to see if I've come to my senses. Otherwise, my "no pup pledge" might be going by the wayside.

Uh-oh.

How's your Sunday?
Welcome to www.TheFiftyFactor.com - Joanna Jenkins
Photo Credit: Joanna Jenkins

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Look Before You Leap


Not far from my Ohio hometown, a high speed police chase recently ended with a suspect scaling a very high fence to get away. Than things went very wrong.

Let me back up.

It seems 20 year old Ricky Flowers thought he could out run the local police who were trying to pull him over for a traffic citation. After racing through several communities followed by lights and sirens, Mr. Flowers decided to ditch his car and took off on foot.

He ran until he came to a great big chain link fence-- Topped with barbed wire-- That he successfully got past, despite numerous cuts and scrapes.

Did he getaway? Not exactly.

It was the wee hours of the morning and very dark outside so Mr. Flowers failed to notice the fence he so successfully scaled belonged to a correctional facility-- You know-- A prison.

Yes, he "escaped" smack into the middle of the prison yard, with lights blaring, alarms sounding and I'm guessing a lot of guns pointed directly at him.

Dude! (You idiot).

If that wasn't embarrassing enough, it was an all women's state prison, and no, he did not make a love connection, nor was he invited to stay but he might have picked up the old "ball and chime" while he was there.

Mr. Flowers was arrested, taken to a men's jail and charged with a slew of crimes, not the least of which should be that he's a blooming idiot!

Breaking into a prison, is that poetic justice of what?
Welcome to www.TheFiftyFactor.com - Joanna Jenkins
Photo Credit: © Elenathewise - Fotolia.com
PS Thanks to all of you for your kind words and prayers for my family.