Woman in the Middle

Now that our weather here in So Cal has been hinting that it might actually change seasons, my thoughts have turned to winter. I love all seasons as each has its own set of joys. But with winter on my mind, I have been contemplating what I like about that season. Here is what I have decided:

1. With the time change it gets dark earlier. After the sun goes down the dust, dirt and animal induced fur balls just aren’t as visible. Keep the lights on low and invite friends and family over after dark and you don’t have to clean nearly as much!!!  Needless to say, just for this one thing alone winter is my kind of season!

2. I am the descendent of many many pale people from northern Europe. Winter gives me the chance to cover up much more of that blindingly white skin. Good for me and good for everyone around me!

3. I have also packed on a few too many pounds. Face it, winter clothes help camouflage that as well!

4. Even in California, the plants as least slow down their growth in the winter time. It also actually rains on occasion, like it has the last two nights. So, except for the massive amount of oranges I will have to start picking at the end of December, my duties in the yard as at their lowest. I can just enjoy it without have to tackle it.  And, yes, except when it is raining, I can still on the patio and enjoy the  yard.

5. Finally, I can turn on the oven and enjoy all of those things that come from a hot oven like roasts and breads and such without having to break the bank account by also turning on the air conditioner. I am not saying I HAVE done this, I am just saying I CAN do it if I want to!

If you have been a reader of my blog since the beginning or close to it, you may have picked up hints about a side of my life that I don’t talk much about in this blog. I happen to be very involved in what I hope is the betterment of my community. I have lived in the Jurupa Valley area most of my life. I was born here, I graduated from high school here, I met my dear Hubby here, and now Hubby and I have raised our kids here. It is not a perfect place but it is a pretty darn good place. Several years ago a group of people decided to explore the idea of our group of communities becoming a city. I joined that effort and it was a wonderful day when the voters saw fit to incorporate Jurupa Valley as a city.

Our little group of people did everything we were supposed to do. Most importantly we did a financial analysis of what amount of money a city of Jurupa Valley would have to work with. Happily it was plenty to continue the services we were getting from the county and more. More things like increased law enforcement, increased code enforcement, and increased road maintenance. After my daughter was hit by a drunk driver at 9:30 one Friday night that law enforcement piece became very important to Hubby and I.

Then, a weird and unthinkable thing happened. Just two days before our official incorporation date of July 1, 2011, the State of California, in a moment of complete ignorance about how new cities are financed in this state, took away all vehicle license fee revenue from its cities. Due to the complicated way things like property tax, sales tax, and these vehicle license fees are distributed in California (which I won’t bore you with here) this was a particularly devastating hit on the budgets of the four newest cities in our state, and most particularly my city of Jurupa Valley. We lost, I kid you not, $6.7 million dollars, which was 47% or our first year budget. Que the gnashing of teeth and loud wailing!

Much effort has been made by our city council and staff to rectify this situation. Unfortunately, nothing has happened that will restore that money to us. If we do not get that money restored to us by the state very soon, we will have to disincorporate. We can not declare bankruptcy because we have no debt. We just literally do not have enough money to keep our city government going. We will reach the point of no return on July 1, 2013. That is when we no longer have enough money to keep going. Thanks California!

A small group of us decided that standing around and wringing our hands in distress about the looming death of our city was not helping the situation or helping us sleep at night. We have formed a non-profit organization called “Save Jurupa Valley.” We realize that putting a tax on the ballot is a non starter. It won’t pass. We decided instead to ask people for donations. We pulled out our trusty calculators and figured out that $6.7 million is only $70 a person or $250  household, given our current population.

Do we think we will raise $6.7 million? Well…no…as much as we would like to think we could. But if we could raise, say, $1 million, now that would make a difference! The longer we keep our city alive, the longer we have to work with the State to fix this serious problem. I appreciate that you, who probably live nowhere near my fair city, have read all the way down to the end of this post.  I would, of course, really appreciate it if you would go to www.savejurupavalley.org and making a pledge or donation. But what I would REALLY REALLY appreciate is if you would help me use the power of the internet to spread the word about my little city that won’t let a big bully like the State of California beat it up until it dies. If you would like me to guest post, I can. If you would pass this information on, I would love you forever. If you know someone at some sort of media outlet that you can pass this story to, I would do everything in my power to name my first grandchild after you! Or, if my daughters won’t cooperate with that I will at least name my next dog after you!!! Thanks again for reading all the way down to the end of this very long post. Repeat after me – “SAVE JURUPA VALLEY!”

Some things happened this weekend. Not only did it include Thanksgiving (which was cooked by me and held at my house), it also included my birthday and the beginnings of the holiday season including a show and a visit to our local Festival of trees. Looking back, I am surprise I managed to get out of bed this morning! In addition to all I just mentioned, the weekend included some other oddball things I thought I would share with all of you.

Most Unexpected Event

We went to a restaurant Saturday night. It took us a while to get there (darn those California freeways!) so when we arrived I made a quick side trip to the ladies room. As I approached the door of said room a little girl in pink glittery cowboy boots came out of the door. She saw me and went right back in. Odd, I thought. It was only a two stall room . She went in one stall and I went in the other. The lack of noise from the other stall made me wonder what was happening over there. I looked over and saw the pink boots facing towards the toilet. My mom radar was really going off now! So I leaned down a little bit and saw brown hair touching the ground. I leaned still father down and saw two little eyes peaking at me under the stall wall. Sigh! I put on my best “Don’t Mess With Me” mother voice and before you know it that dratted little girl was scrambling out of that bathroom. Not what I was expecting to deal with when I went out to dinner!

The “It Goes Everywhere” Award

The holidays always get me in a crafty mood. I usually try to let it pass because who has time to craft things at this time of year? But this year I was reminded of those ornaments you can make out of old Christmas cards. I went to work and discovered I could make them while watching TV. Before you know it I had made almost a dozen of them.  As a finishing touch I decided to put glitter on the edges of the ornaments. They turned out really cute but we now have glitter EVERYWHERE. It is on all four family members and on the dog and the cat! It is on the furniture and in the bathrooms…. It is not like I was skipping through the house blowing glitter everywhere! We will still be finding glitter on ourselves in July. I just know it….

Most Amusing Thing a Family Member Said

Eldest daughter has totally gotten into crafty as well. One thing she is having fun working with at the moment are melty beads, otherwise known as Perler beads. You remember them…You make a design on a little peg board, cover it with a special piece of paper and iron the design until the beads melt together and form one solid piece. She is making all kinds of designs, mainly of action figures and such which she plans to giver her friend for Christmas. Saturday as we were going into a craft store we were talking about her melty bead obsession and she defended herself by saying, “People just don’t appreciate the melty bead arts.” I had to laugh at that!

Direct TV is Not My Friend

Last week I told you about the problem with Fed Ex delivering a reconditioned tuner box to our house addressed to the people we bought the house from almost 3 years ago.(Read about it here) It took Fed Ex from Friday until the following Tuesday to pick the box back up. Sigh! Then, today, I kid you not, they delivered another one!!!  I have to assume the “Smiths” complained to Direct TV about their new tuner not showing up and yet another one was sent out to them. Why oh why in this transaction didn’t some one have the brains to confirm the original one was sent to the correct address?

I finally gave up and looked the former owners up and called them directly. I find this to be a bit awkward became we bought the house from them in a short sale.However, this problem with Direct TV must be solved! I left a message and haven’t heard back from them yet. Maybe with Christmas coming I can wrap the new tuner box and it can become part of my holiday decor. I have no idea what I will do with it come January, but at least it would solve my problem temporarily.

Because I am still recovering from my Turkey hangover and because I got up at 4 a.m. to go shopping and no amount of napping today is going to make up for that, I am sharing with you a Thanksgiving memory that I posted last year about this time. Hope you had a great Thanksgiving!

One of my all time favorite foods is sweet potatoes, especially candied sweet potatoes. I really really really love them, but I only got them once a year when I was a child, on that day of days, Thanksgiving. One of my least favorite foods are marshmallows. I don’t hate them, as I will eat them, especially when they are associated with s’mores. But it is a rare occasion when I let a marshmallow cross my lips.

Both my mother and my grandmother (who was my dad’s mom) were amazing cooks. Really fantastic in a way I never will be. My mother always hosted the big holiday meals because my grandmother lived in a single wide mobile home and there just wasn’t enough room. But my grandmother, who we called Nanny, always brought something yummy to the holiday dinner.  I always looked forward to Thanksgiving and those candied sweet potatoes, southern style, with no yucky marshmallows on top.

Then, one year, when I was about seven or eight years old, the sweet potatos, I realized in horror, had been placed in a casserole dish, covered with marshmallows, and run under a broiler! Yuck! So I said, in a very upset and petulant way, “Mom, why do these sweet potatoes have marshmallows on them????!!!!????” My mother replied, in a very nice voice, “Your grandmother made them.” Whoa! In spite of my youth I realized that I had just made a faux pas of the highest order! And I needed to correct it fast! So, changing my attitude on a dime, I said in my sweetest voice,  “The sweet potatoes are  good, Nanny.”   Nothing else was said. I ate the marshmallows with gusto. And neither my mother nor my grandmother ever put marshmallows on the sweet potatoes again. A Thanksgiving miracle if there ever was one!

For your Thanksgiving amusement:

Below is a photo of President Harry S. Truman receiving a turkey in November 1949. I think we can all officially declare that it is hard for a president to look presidential when he is posing with a turkey.

To further prove my point, here is President Richard M. Nixon with a turkey in November 1969.

Hope you have a good turkey day, everyone (at least everyone in the United States) and remember, no photos with live turkeys!

Nothing is more exciting than the Fed Ex Driver dropping off a package at your door, especially at this time of year, right? Well, last week I discovered that is not always the case.

On Thursday evening the door bell rang about 5:30 p.m. and I heard a clunk and running footsteps. The dog and I ran to the door and we both went outside to see what was happening. Just then the Fed Ex truck drove away from in front of my house. I looked down and saw a good-sized package. I assumed Hubby ordered something. I picked up the package and dragged it inside. Being the nosy wife that I am I inspected the return address. Direct TV? We don’t have Direct TV! Then I looked at the shipping address. It was addressed to the previous owner of our house! For the purposes of this post I will call him “John Smith.”

I decided to ignore the package that evening and deal with it Friday. Friday afternoon I inspected the package again. It said it was a reconditioned tuner. You would have thought that Direct TV would have confirmed the address before sending out said tuner. You would have thought John Smith would have confirmed the address for the delivery. You would think after us owning this house for two years and 8 months this would no longer be an issue. Guess not to all three things!!

Since the tuner was shipped to Mr. Smith from Direct TV I decided to call them. Mistake No. 1! I went online and called the only number I could find, which was their customer service number. They are really not set up to deal with someone who does not want service and doesn’t presently have service. I just kept saying “no” every time they asked me an automated question until I finally got connected to a real person. Then the real person had no more gotten “How Can I help you?” out of her mouth when we were disconnected. I got a few choice words out of my mouth and called the toll-free number again. Again I played a coy game of cat and mouse with the automated voice until I punched the wrong button, and was told I made an invalid entry and was instructed to call the 800 number again. Yeah, no. I changed tactics at that point. I called Fed Ex.

Fed Ex had an automated system as well but it was willing to send me to a real person a lot sooner than Direct TV. I explained what happened and the young man with a southern accent (southern U.S., not southern India) took care of the problem right away. Because I was calling in the late afternoon they couldn’t get it that day and so I was told it would bes whisked away the following day, which happened to be Saturday. Thank you Fed Ex!

A little while later Hubby came in carrying a padded manila envelope. I couldn’t believe it but Fed Ex had managed to deliver ANOTHER item from Direct TV to Mr. Smith and this time I didn’t even know it! I dragged everything out on the porch, happy knowing it would all disappear the next day. Except it didn’t! Hubby deals with Fed Ex quite a bit at his business and he informed me that they usually don’t do Saturday pick ups and deliveries. So the nice young man had given me incorrect information. Sigh! I am really hoping that Fed Ex picks it all up today sometime. I am hoping they take both the box and the envelope. Otherwise I don’t know what I am going to do with the reconditioned tuner and the mystery item in the envelope. They don’t look holiday festive on my porch, either!

As for Direct TV, I have no plans to get their service any time soon. They can’t even deliver a package to the right address. As for their customer service I wouldn’t know, since they hung up on me twice! Fed Ex wasn’t perfect either but they weren’t all bad. I may feel differently if they never pick up those packages!

A nearby street was recently repaved. That was cause for much celebrating in my neighborhood due to the state of that road. After the repaving was complete, the crew went through and painted temporary lines as well as temporary arrows in all the left turn lanes.  Whoever painted the arrows decided to be a little creative. Each arrow featured a different face. I love it when some one takes a fairly routine job and has some fun with it! I couldn’t resist taking some photos and sharing them with you.   I salute you, arrow painting man! (I assume it was a man, I didn’t see any woman in this particular crew.) Sadly, the arrows all have their permanent paint jobs now, and the funny faces are all covered over. But I will always have my photos!

A nice bright smiley face brought a smile to my face!

Since it was right before Halloween, the jack-o-lantern face was appropriate!

Snake face? Maybe….

Happy Happy!

It wasn’t near Easter, but the bunny face is still cute!

If anyone can tell me what this is, I would really appreciate it!

Over the summer my Eldest Daughter mentioned to me that every Coke bottle cap has a code, and if you enter it at the Coke Rewards site you get points. With those points you get free stuff. Free stuff? I love free stuff! I went right over and checked out the free stuff I could get. What caught my eye were the magazine subscriptions. I immediately began saving Coke caps for their magic little codes. There are also codes on the 12 and 24-count packages of Coke products. Word got out to one of Youngest Daughter’s friends and she started saving them for me as well. I admit I also picked up a few Coke bottles in parking lots….please don’t judge me!

Well, I just got my first issue of All You Magazine, paid for with Coke points! Somehow, those articles and photos are sweeter knowing I got them for free! So, if you have a steady supply of coke bottle caps or 12 or 24 pack cartons I highly recommend checking out the Coke Rewards site and signing up. Free is always better! The site is located here: http://www.mycokerewards.com

One helpful hint: The Coke Rewards site is always offering deals to help you get more points, which can be seen on their ”Offers and Promotions” page. Right now, for example, if you enter Coke Zero or Powerade codes Coke automatically doubles the points they are worth. I usually hold on to my bottle cap or carton codes for a while to try to maximize my points. With my little plastic bag full of bottle caps waiting on my desk, I can usually take advantage of a special double points deal when it comes up.

BTW, I have no special deal going with Coke or its rewards program. I just like free stuff!

A few nights ago, about 3:30 a.m., I heard pacing outside my bedroom door.  I realized what must have happened. Dry bowl syndrome. Honey the dog had run out of water and was getting a little antsy about it.

I dragged myself out of bed to fix the problem. Thank goodness my eyes were adjusted to the darkness. As I turned the corner from the hall into the den I noted a dark something on the floor. I stopped, turned on a light, and there, right in the middle of the path of traffic and exactly 12 inched from my husband’s tennis shoes, was a pile. This was not an “Oops, hidden because I just can’t help myself” pile. This was a  “damn people didn’t refill my water bowl so I am going to show them my displeasure  in a very obvious way” pile.

And some people think dogs are dumb. If she just had opposable thumbs I am sure Honey would take over the house. She is way too smart for us. And her communication skills? Spot on!

Her placement, shall we say, rivaled Blackie the cat’s “I am annoyed” pile of 2008. We went away for two nights to the beach. It was summer and it was hot and we didn’t want to leave him in the garage. Because of coyotes we didn’t want him outside at night either.  So we brought the litter box in, left plenty of food and water, and off we went. When we came home the litter box had been used several times. But right in the middle of the living room, where we couldn’t miss it, was one perfect poo. We received that message loud and clear as well. The cat did not like being left in the house over the weekend.   Blackie is now a house cat and he is doesn’t mind being in the house all the time. He leaves the perfect poo placement to the dog.

My mom had a friend named Maurine Jones. She was a wonderful lady, funny, energetic, and someone I always enjoyed being around. But her greatest legacy, at least in my family, is her recipe for Chuck Wagon Beans. I made these beans for a recent get together and, once again, people told me how much they enjoyed them and requested the recipe. I thought I would share it with the rest of you since it is so yummy!   The most unusual thing about this recipe is that it includes green beans, which really adds something to it., both taste, texture, and visually. I hope you enjoy Mrs. Jones recipe!

Chuck Wagon Beans

Sauté one bunch green onions or one mature onion (amount to be determined by how much you like onion) along with five strips of bacon, cut in small pieces.

Add the following:

1 can pork and beans (do not drain)

1 can green beans (drained)

1 can pinto beans (drained)

1 can kidney beans (drained)

Add

¾ cup brown sugar (or less to taste)

½  bottle ketchup or chili sauce, Mrs. Jones liked to use half ketchup and half chili sauce. Don’t be scared off by the chili sauce. It is very similar to ketchup and not spicy at all.

Stir everything up and put in a baking dish and bake at 350 degrees until heated through or put in a crock pot.  I have never used the oven method so I don’t know how well that works. I just put everything in the crock pot! Sometimes I put them in early and then I don’t even cook the onion, I just put it in and let it cook in the beans.

The other weekend I left out the bacon and put in a teaspoon of liquid smoke. I also used ketchup and barbecue sauce. It was yummy that way as well.  This is a very forgiving recipe! I hardly look at the recipe anymore and just throw stuff in the pot.  I hope you enjoy it as much as my family does!