Retire In Style Blog Too

Mothers Day is coming!  Here is a piece of advice...go buy a mother a gift.  If the mother is smart she will have already told you what she wants.  That is what I do and I have always told my children to tell their families what they want. How else are those poor clueless husbands, wives and children to know what to buy if someone doesn't give them a hint or push them out the door with directions to the nearest store? I know...it is just so obvious! Shay...our newest Mother's Day Gift! Here my list of things I need for Mother's Day 2012 A Rose bush ...a very healthy rose bush. Aveda Hand Relief   (I love their lotion but it is a big treat to have it.) A book...a really good Award Winning Books .  I just found one that has instructions on how to write a children's book.  I liked that a lot. Portable DVD Player ...every grandma/mother wants one of these.  The kids have one so why can't we? Promise of a dinner or lunch at a nice restaurant...not on Mother...

technorati tags: entertainment , communities Recently I wrote about  POP UP* communities  and what the term has come to mean in the world at large. I find the whole concept fascinating.  In this economy people are being very creative in solving their financial problems. Here in the area where I spend my summers a group of day laborers turn up on a corner near a community center every morning during the week and people drive up in their cars or pickups and hire someone to help them out with odd jobs.  I don't know if it is "legal" in the strictest sense of the word but it is a system that is working for everyone. It is a POP UP community that provided a service working outside of the regulations and ordinances. No harm no foul!  In POP UP community post I talked about other kinds of gatherings doing exactly the same thing. A Pop Up Community is simply a temporary community of people that gather in an unexpected place.  It can involve an art show or just a pa...

A while back I wrote an article for Blog Critics about  ATT and their link with Toms Shoes.   ATT created an ad in 2009 that featured the Toms Shoes mission and their connection to ATT phone services. The story was about how Toms Shoes gives away one pair of shoes to children in developing countries for every one purchased. The cause started by Blake Mycoskie has come to be known as the  One-for-One Movement .  The TV ad run by ATT was where many people learned about the concept for the first time. In 2006 Toms had sold 10,000 shoes.  By the end of 2010 they had sold their millionth pair.  The rest is history. Toms Shoes website page In 2006, American traveler  Blake  Mycoskie befriended children in Argentina and found they had no shoes to protect their feet. Wanting to help, he created  TOMS Shoes , a company that would match every pair of shoes purchased with a pair of new shoes given to a child in need. One for One. Blake returned t...

Back Patio's Summertime Look Technorati Tags: HGTV,   lifestyle ,  travel Seriously, our front yard look like a neglected vacant lot when I arrived home from Arizona 2 weeks ago. I live in the Portland, Or. metro area.  Things grow here fast and well...even weeds. Six months with not one whit of care left our flower beds littered with leaves and a million sprouting maple seeds.  All I could think was that someone in the neighborhood could have called the HGTV Yard Crashers and tv cameras would appear.  The lady next door would tell the tv people how she could hardly wait for them to clean up the trash so she would have something beautiful to look at. I would be embarrassed. If you are a snowbird that owns two places, you know what I am talking about. This is one of the dilemmas that faces us each year.  There is a need for us to keep our home's appearance up if for no other reason than to make it look as though someone is at home.  Nothing invites trou...

Nob Hill, San Francisco, California. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) A fellow blogger,  Bag Lady in Waiting , has been posting about couch surfing .  She and her husband are busy people promoting a book they have written about his experiences in Vietnam and traveling.  But this last week they decided to do a little trip into the south and use the opportunity to find out about that couch surfing thing. Couch Surfing  has a website for those that love the adventure of getting to know new people.  The first time I read about it was back in 2009 so it has been around for a while.  The website is recommended by NYTs, Frugal Traveler, Time and NPR.  You will get information for places to stay based on your profile, activities in the city you will be visiting and even people that are doing things and want you to come along. The Bag Lady traveled with her husband and stayed several night with people along their route.  Some they could talk politics w...

My husband and I in Spain! I didn't make the bed today.  My husband and I have been spending some time apart.  I flew home for the birth of our last grandchild and he chose to remain in Arizona for a little more time. We do this occasionally...it is a practice session for being alone.  He will be home tonight or tomorrow. So I don't make the bed sometimes when I am alone...shoot me if you like! Today I needed to change the bed so I just washed the sheets.  They are laying on the bed in a heap. The sheets were dirty. That is my first excuse.  Then I wanted to do some yard work. As I raked up the last leaf I realized I need to go and buy some more coffee.  As I was driving to the grocery I remembered that I wanted to have sushi and my husband doesn't jump at that suggestion.  I shopped and then drove to the sushi restaurant.  It is a beautiful day so I drove home at a leisurely pace. I still haven't made the bed.  I've taken a nap, cleaned up t...

Baby Shay at 7 days old! This is the last one!  As grandchildren go, she is just about the best last grandchild any grandmother could ever ask for.  She is relaxed, cute cuddly and 9 days old.  What could there possible be to worry about?  I can't think of one thing and I am not going to tempt the fates by reading any advice columns or books.  I may just shut myself in the house and not even talk to anyone.  It turns out that everyone book has a horror story and all grandparents are so proud of their offspring's offspring that I can never top their stories. I don't like advise books and other people's grandchildren if they are better than mine.  No, I am thinking about becoming a recluse! I was reading a blog post from the Huffington Post today called New Grandparenting Books Offer Advice From Two Perspectives by Dr. Georgia Witkin's.  The blog author, Karin Kasdin, talked about how little time she had , how little patience she had with the how-...

Retire In Style Daily News...front page! Technorati Tags: paper.li, onlinenewspapers, twitter, gawker Oh my gosh!  I just read Gawker so I cannot be held responsible for what I might do.  That blog just blows my sock off almost every day.  I don't know if you should read it or not.  It is just a tad big bad liberal talk ...but there is always a lot of unvarnished truth.  I follow Gawker on twitter...that is important for you to know right up front. I started an online daily newspaper with an application called paper.li .  It is free to all my readers, their friends and...well...everyone.  It is called Retire In Style Daily News .  I don't know how paper.li works but I love who ever designed it.  They are beyond good.  In a simple explanation (no technical talk here) they said: Paper.li is a content curation service . It enables people to publish newspapers based on topics they like and treat their readers to fresh news, daily....

Over the falls from Tumblr . My husband sent me an email with this photo attached.  Do you get it?  ...some days are  like looking over the fall.  It may be that you could skip this part of life and move back a little.  What do you think!

Once in a while it all falls into place like poetry.  A day that starts with flowers for my yard can emerge as perfectly versed in every way.  That is what has happened to me on this day.  It is a day for the NYT's, Bumble Bees and Clementine. Love in the New York Times With this Cottage...   appeared in the times this week and was revisited this morning in a corrected version.  The charming story is about two people, one an artist with tourettes and a man that fell madly in love with her.  He is very neat, she lives like a rock star, trashing the world around her with artistic furor.  They cannot live together and they cannot live apart.  So they own two houses, side by side and co-habitate both together and separately.  I loved the story of two people that are so different finding a way to love each other. When I opened the Times this morning and saw this story again, I smiled.  Yes the NYT's does publish stories about good people but ...

The letter style post on Crazy Baby Momma's Blog was like a glass of ice water on the face! The blog post was called  Six Rules You Need to Lay Down Before You Friend Your Parents on Facebook . Obviously her parents  were under the illusion that Facebook was their private space and they could just comment on their daughter's love life and complexion without a worry.  The daughter didn't like her baby picture on a bear rug being posted for all her friends to see so she asked Mom and Dad to stop.  The parents were on the edge of being unfriended and removed from the Facebook account unless they cleaned their act up. The list of no-nos included some of the following: Everything is  PUBLIC  on Facebook...absolutely everything! Please quit trying to play match maker...it is embarrassing. There really is no need to comment on everything. If the daughter removed a comment or note it means they didn't want the world to see said comment or note.  Please Mom and...

Quote :  It said on the tombstone "I told you I was ill!" Saturday, April 7, 2012 Dear Mary and Carole, I am fine...really I am. It is true I have been a little ill, ran a fever, went to the doctor, spend the week trying to live through the day and have not eaten. But I am fine...really I am. No, I did not call you because I thought it would be tacky. Don't think I didn't want to. If I had, I would have said, "Carole, Mary get yourself over here. I am really sick and I need for you to come fix me." But being the lady that I am I didn't do that. Please don't be mad. It doesn't mean I don't need you guys.  Because I do. Thank you for the card and the candied pecans. I felt better immediately. What would I ever do without you? So here it is...I am sorry. I will never do that again. Love, Barbara

My son and I were having a conversation the other evening about the difference between tolerance and acceptance. It was something I had never given a thought to. My goal has always been to get through the day or situation without hurting anyones feelings. In fact, the older I get the harder it has become.  Tolerating people or viewpoints that I disagree with can be very difficult but we are all grown up right? So we can get through a cocktail hour without a knock down and drag out. I know we can. We can tolerate each other for a little while. I've learned that people will forget what you said,  people will forget what you did,   but people will never  forget how you made them feel. Maya Angelou Still, the concept of acceptance is totally different. It closes the door on the effort to change another's opinions. There is no right and wrong. There is only an accepted contrast of opinions. Have you ever thought about that?  It can also help us grow and lear...

JDH doesn't tell much about himself...he just writes a great blog called Blue Orchid of Texas . I found him via a website for people over the age of 30.  Google describes his blog as "wildly popular".  He is funny and irreverent but I suspect that under that blogs exterior hides a writer with a big heart and a worthy calling.  Best of all he makes me laugh.  I like that a lot. Here is a blog he wrote for me telling about the day he received his AARP card.  We can all relate to this one!  AARP card + a FREE insulated bag...wow! “All Hands On Deck” by Blue Orchid of Texas I could tell right away when the sunlight hit the envelope that it was not your typical junk mail piece. I could see that as I turned it over in my hand and closed the mailbox door with my other, that this was a quality piece of messaging. I confess that at first glance I thought it was a piece from the American Automobile Association (AAA) as I get one or two offers to join per month from t...

Can you write about travel ? I would love to hear from you if you are a fellow blogger. I have found that a variety of voices add so much to the blog.  I am not sure how to go about this so here I am inviting you & you & you. I am prompted to this because I attended a class/presentation by a retired professor at a major university in the midwest.  She and her husband, also a retired professor, talked about the history of Russian women.  It was absolutely fascinating.  The topic on that afternoon was the Stalin era.  The gentleman gave a history leading up to Stalin's time and she lead a discussion on how women fit into to the picture during WWII.  We all walked away with something new to discuss and think about. I have heard a lot of young people talk about past conversations with parents or aunts/uncles. They will say, "It was the same list of litanies of complaints over and over."  I think we have all been there at one time or another.  ...

Have you ever wondered what you child's spouse really thinks of you?  I tell my family that I know they talk about me when I go home and I don't like that.  The truth is I know when my foot is in my mouth because it hurts and tastes bad.  Let's not talk about it ok. I don't like to sit in the corner and be quiet so I have to guard my mouth to the point of being in pain.  I always thought it was really hard for me.  But after reading a blog written on a blog called Blue Orchid I realized what pain the children can be in.  The poor dears suffer beyond belief! The blog called Dirty Dancing with the Blob  is about a weekend visit from the in-laws. The poor man does not think there is enough whiskey or Junior Mints in the house to see him through.  He details those things that drive him crazy when his in-laws visit: In-law lunch: Wine and Styrofoam container with left-overs.texture of the food...too much whole wheat maybe Complaints about spicy fo...

Moral of this story:  Laugh at the idiots scammers...they can't help themselves. The email was forwarded to me...you know, the email warning about safety at the gas pump.  It seems that women and cell phones and the filling stations just sets people off.  So an idiot someone had the brilliant idea to embellish a safety warning put out by the Petroleum Equipment Industry pertaining to gas pump fires. (In case you are wondering, the key to getting an email like this to go viral is to include just enough truth and include some hate or prejudice.) If the sender of the email had read the message closely, they would have seen that it was written to offend women.  In the case of this woman,  she was not offended.  It made her laugh until she was crying.  Honestly! THE PHONY EMAIL: We have become so comfortable around gas stations that we forget just how deadly gasoline can be and how easy it is to ignite.... Shell Oil Safety Alert! Four Rules for Safe Refue...