Category: Daily Blog

This is my Daily Blog category.

My broken arm is on the mend

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily BlogLeave a comment

cartoon mike healing broken arm

I am very happy to report that my arm is healing and I can finally go back to my normal routine.  I’ve had a great vacation from my chores for the last month, but it’s time to go back to work.

Well, the truth is, I’ve been doing certain chores like laundry and doing light cleaning here and there, it’s dishes that were too difficult to do.  I even mowed the lawn 2 weeks ago with just one arm lol.  I didn’t do it last week or this week because, well, I’m lazy lol.  I did the dishes today with both arms and laundry yesterday with both arms and it did hurt a tiny bit, but it didn’t hurt so much that I had to stop.

It’s funny how you think that you want to not have to do things, but after awhile you start to miss it.  I know that sounds odd, but it’s true.

I am still wearing the sling when I walk the dog or when I’m just fartin’ around the house because it feels uncomfortable to just let it hang, it even hurts if I’m not holding it up, but when I’m just laying in bed or doing dishes or laundry I can take it off.

The part of my arm that broke is still in a bit of pain, but what is causing me the most pain is the middle of my arm because my arm is bent 24/7 and I guess it just needs to stretch after awhile.  You know how when you are in the car for too long and it’s nice to get out and stretch your legs?  Well, it’s basically the same thing.

The E.R. doctor said it would take 6 to 8 weeks to heal and it’s been 4 1/2 weeks and I can tell that it won’t take a full 8 weeks.  I’m sure I still have another couple of weeks of wearing the sling, then I can probably take it off for good.  Although I can’t predict the future, but I’m sure I’ll be good soon.

I’ve never broken a bone in my body in my whole life so I’ve never experienced this and even though it was torture for me, I’m glad it happened because I finally got to know what it was like.  I know that sounds silly or strange, but it just seems like something I should have experienced at least once in my life.  I don’t have a bucket list, but I think if I did, breaking a bone would have been on it.  That’s not to say I want to experience it again lol.  I can’t imagine ever going through that again so I’m going to have to be really careful from now on.

Anyway, I can’t wait for my arm to heal completely so I can go back to normal, whatever normal is.

Writing on and putting up walls

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily BlogLeave a comment

brick wall

I think as a human being we all have the right to our own happiness, right?  I mean, it’s what I would love to believe.  So when I write something silly or even stupid on my Facebook wall, blog and/or Twitter, I’d like to think that I shouldn’t get criticized or yelled at for sharing random personal information about myself.

When people start talking down to me and I have never even said boo to them, I build walls in my head and they usually never come down.  I like to think that I give people enough chances before I put up this wall.  After 42 years of having people treat me like dirt, the amount of chances a person gets goes down.  You have heard of the three strikes law right?  Well, I used to give people 3 chances.  But then I’ve heard the saying “Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me.”  So screw 3 strikes, if you are rude to me a second time then that’s it, I’m done.  And believe me, when I say to you “I’m done” at the end of an argument, that means I’m finished with you.  I may not unfriend you, but I will remove you from any streams so I can’t see what you are saying and I will restrict you from seeing what I say in the future, that way I don’t give you any chances to be rude to me.

Why is it that people are always rude to me though?  I never say or do anything bad to anyone.  I’m never rude or belligerent with people on purpose.  I don’t tell people how to live their lives, so why do people do that to me?  I don’t get it.  This is my life, I pay the rent, I pay the bills, I buy the groceries, I am who is responsible for my life, not other people, so why do they feel the need to criticize me when I say something that is meaningless to them?  I never talk down to people because who the heck am I to do that to them?  So who the heck are people to talk down to me?  Screw them!  Who needs them anyway?

I have built so many walls that if I were building a house, I would have at least 1 floor of a 2 bedroom house completed.  I’m not joking either.  It sucks that I have to live this way.

I am just venting… sorry you had to see that.

My Cloudy Lava Lamp (FIXED)

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily Blog3 Comments

httpvh://youtu.be/RPYaW_NTJZ4

I am a happy camper today.  I was at my wit’s end with this lava lamp because when I cleaned it, it didn’t work again.  It just sat there with the blob of wax sitting at the bottom and never doing anything.  This morning I just started adding more and more straw fulls of salt water and boy has it come back from the dead fast.  I mean, it’s night and day.

I posted this about my cloudy lava lamp and talked near the end about how done with it I was and that I was going to just get a new one, but I take it back now lol.  You can see pictures of my experience with the epsom salt.  It was a total nightmare!

So this is how I fixed my yellow cloudy lava lamp.  I dumped the water out, rinsed it out in the sink, added distilled water, then a drop of Avon body wash, made a mixture of 1TBSP of salt with a small glass of distilled water and stirred it.  I used a straw to add the salt water to the lava lamp, but I had to add a lot of straws full.  I think just keep adding it until you see it doing something.  Obviously if the lava is just sitting at the bottom it needs more salt water.  If it starts to kick up but doesn’t break away too easy, add more salt water.

YAY!  I finally got my lava lamp back to working!  My partner suggested to throw it in the trash and he’d buy me another one, but I don’t want another one, I want this one!  He bought it for me for Christmas 2011.  I also don’t like the idea of adding one more thing to the already overflowing land fills.  I know everything in it can be recycled, but I still wanted to try to get it working again.  I’m glad I succeeded!

Cloudy Lava Lamp (Updated)

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily Blog1 Comment

lavalamp

I have enjoyed my lava lamp since I got it for Christmas last year.  It is my very first lava lamp and I sit at my desk chair sometimes staring at it for literally 10-20 minutes.  It is that interesting to me.  What is even more interesting, or probably more disturbing, is the fact that the water used to be crystal clear, and now it’s yellow.  I don’t know why it has turned yellow, but apparently it’s a common problem with lava lamps.

Here is my lava lamp in December 2011 when I first got it, and here it is now in January 2013 a year later.

 lava lamp december 2012 lava lamp january 2013

What a huge difference.  I wonder what would cause the water to turn yellow like that?  I never thought anything of it until I was browsing through the pictures in the My Pictures folder on my computer and came across it.  I then suddenly remembered how clear it used to be.  Naturally I went to Google to research it to see if anyone else has had this issue and to see if there was anything to do about it.  I did find several websites that mentioned it and even a solution.

Update: I deleted everything I had typed out before and retyped it.  I took out those links and here is why.  I followed their instructions which seemed legit to me because more than one website mentioned the same exact thing, but all it did was mess up my lamp.  Here is what it looked like after I tried their fix.

lava very cloudy from salt

I was devastated when this happened to my lava lamp.  The instructions were to let it cool so the wax was solid and open the top of the lava lamp and dump the water out into the sink.  Then put new water from the tap in and swish it around to get all the grease off the walls of the lamp which meant doing that a couple of times.  Then they said to fill it up with tap water and add a couple drops of dish liquid and add a mixture of epsom salt and water with a straw.  Those white flakes in the image to the left is the result of the epsom salt.

I let the lamp cool down and dumped the water out and added new water and more soap, but not the epsom salt and turned it on and there was still epsom salt in the wax at the bottom, so it took several times of rinsing it out to get it back to this…

lava afterI was thrilled beyond belief when the lava lamp was back to normal and the lava was rising.  But then it stopped rising and went back down and never went back up again.  What did I do wrong?  Like an idiot I mixed a tiny amount of epsom salt with a lot of water and added an inch full from a straw and I got that image from above again.  UGH!

That blew my mind that such a tiny amount of epsom salt would do the same thing as a bunch of epsom salt in a smaller amount of water.  I didn’t know what I was supposed to do.  I rinsed it out again and didn’t add ANY salt at all and the lava wouldn’t go up again.  I searched for more instructions because I really want this working again.  I found one guy who made a video and said don’t use too much soap because it will ruin your lava lamp.  He also said to use 1 tablespoon of regular table salt and use the straw to add it, which I did and it still won’t rise.

I’m not sure if every time I had to rinse it out and added more soap if the soap ruined the wax or what, but it’s not rising anymore at all.  I rinsed it out again and didn’t add anything and it is just not working.  I think I screwed it up beyond repair.

Of course I have questions, like did I use the wrong dish liquid?  It’s Palmolive anti-bacterial, maybe it didn’t have enough of the right ingredient.  Maybe I used the wrong epsom salt.  The epsom salt I have is generic and it’s hard as a rock.  I assume it’s because the ziplock bag it is in wasn’t manufactured properly because the zips don’t line up right so air gets in, maybe that’s why it’s hard, maybe moisture got in.  Perhaps if I bought a brand name epsom salt then it might work, but what if I bought some and tried it and it still messed it up?  What if, what if, what if…

Another update:  It works!  Here is a brand new post with a video.

Wait 24 hours before hitting the panic button

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily Blog1 Comment

HPNX1994

Imagine walking to the grocery store with really bad back pain just to buy 1 gallon of milk so you can make dinner.  You get there and you are heading to the check stand and you reach into your back pocket only to discover that it’s empty.  Just before panic sets in, you try the other pocket, then the front pockets and then check your jacket pockets.  Nothing.  You forgot your wallet!  *FACEPALM*

You sort of laugh it off, but you text your loved one at home asking them to grab your wallet and bring it to the store, but when they arrive, they didn’t bring your wallet.  When you get back to the house with groceries already paid for, you go check your desk where you thought it was, but it’s not there.  You look everywhere and panic sets in.

That happened to me last night.  I was in complete panic.  Even though I added the milk to the dinner and turned the stove back on, dinner was the last thing on my mind, in fact, I had lost my appetite.  I ransacked the whole house 20 times.  I checked the bank website and of course nothing had happened, but in my panic I called them to have them block my debit card so it can’t be used and issued me a new card which cost $5.

Even though I knew it wasn’t in there, I checked the car at least 3 or 4 times.  I checked the trash cans, I even looked in the freezer and the refrigerator… just in case.

When I woke up this morning, naturally I had to search the entire house again, and then again every hour.  I knew that someone else had it and that I would never see it again, but I still had hope that I’d still find it in the house somewhere.

I was in the living room less than 24 hours after I lost my wallet standing behind a chair and I moved my foot toward the chair and stepped on something soft.  At first I thought the dog had an accident, so I moved my foot away and looked and saw what looked exactly like my wallet.  At first I was thinking that perhaps it was wishful thinking.  I focused my eyes a bit more and the image of my wallet was still there, so I reached down and picked it up and holy crap, it was my wallet!  I found my wallet!

So, I guess I had reacted way too soon because now I can’t pay for anything until my new debit card comes.  I can write checks, but I really don’t like to do that because if you aren’t careful, they will become like rubber.

It’s awesome that I found my wallet, but I just wish that I had kept an eye on my bank account before calling them to cancel my card to issue me a new one.  If I really did lose my wallet outside, then someone would buy something and if that happened then naturally I would call them and cancel my debit card.  I don’t know, I guess it was a “better safe than sorry” thing.  Now I’m sorry that I was so safe lol.

This wallet is a bit immature for me.  I bought it at the 2012 Bakersfield Gay Pride festival for $5.  I bought it because it reminded me of my vans that I had when I was 15 years old.  It even has velcro lol.  It has a chain on it, but I took it off because of how cheap it is.  When I finally found it, I put the chain back on and clipped it to the belt loop of my pants so that the next time I take off my pants, the wallet won’t fly out of the pocket and this won’t happen again.

The good part of all of this is that I saved $30 because I won’t have to go to the DMV to get a new ID card.  It also saves me from worrying about identity theft because my ID card has my name and address and my insurance card has my social security number on it.  My identity has been stolen before and I would hate to go through that again.

A huge sigh of relief!

Dang It Got Cold Fast!

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily BlogLeave a comment

delonghi safe heat radiator

Most people think that we in California never get cold in the winter time, that it’s always sunny and in the mid 80’s and we’re all wearing flip-flops, shorts and tank tops all year.  Well, I have one friend who thinks that anyway.  To dispel that rumor, it does get cold in the winter time for us here in Sunny California.

Right now as I write this at two in the afternoon, it is 56°F in Bakersfield.  Our walls and roof are supposed to keep us warm right?  Wrong!  For some reason in the summer time, if it’s 100°F outside, it’s usually 110°F inside, but if we have the swamp cooler on, it’s usually 10° cooler inside the house than it is outside.  The same goes for when it’s cold outside, it’s usually 10° colder inside.  I said it was 56° now, but just wait until night-time when it goes down into the 30’s, and in mid to late December it gets down to the 20’s.

Since our central heat doesn’t work anymore, we have to use space heaters.  I have a DeLonghi oil radiator (pictured) in my bedroom that if I keep the hallway door closed, it heats the bedroom, hallway and bathroom.  Darrin has a totally different heater because the oil radiator didn’t keep the entire living room warm, in fact no space heater would heat the whole living room warm so he has a space heater that works like a fan where it blows heat at him.  He hasn’t brought it out yet, but I’ll bet he will soon.

I actually much prefer the winter over the summer because as I have always said, if it’s cold outside, you can add warm clothes and wear blankets and be comfortable, but if it’s too hot outside, you can be naked and still be sticky and miserable.  I’d rather be overdressed in the winter time and be happy.

So cheers to a long cold Winter of being happily overdressed lol.

New York Soda Ban Approved

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily BlogLeave a comment

I recently read an article on the Huffington Post website that sparked something in me, and I have something to say about it.

New York Soda Ban Approved: Board Of Health OKs Limiting Sale Of Large-Sized, Sugary Drinks – Huffington Post

I think, and this is just my opinion, if they are going to be banning things that make you fat, they might as well ban it all. You can’t tell someone they can have 16oz Coke but not a 20oz coke and be ok with them eating a super size french fry and a Big Mac. You can’t just set the limits on one thing and not everything else. If they are going to ban drink sizes, then they might as well ban portion sizes too and make all adults have a kid’s meal. And while they’re at it, they might as well ban 2 liter bottles, Twinkies, cupcakes, and ice cream from the grocery store.

“The limits will not apply to drinks sold in grocery stores, diet sodas, drinks that are more than 70-percent fruit juice, or that contain alcohol.”

The article compares banning drink sizes to banning cigarette smoking in public places.  The problem is that they are forcing people to quit smoking, and now those people are getting fat, so now it is big government who is stepping in once again to take more control over our lives. Well, not our, I live in California, but it starts in New York and where does it end? This is just the spark that will spread like wild-fire throughout the country and next thing I know, I’m not allowed to buy a 32oz diet coke for $1 in the summertime anymore.  I know the limits are not on diet sodas, but how is it fair to limit sodas with sugar, and not diet soda?  The other customers will see me with a 32oz cup and think it’s unfair and then they will end up banning diet coke too.

And yes, I know a little something about getting fat from quitting smoking. They banned smoking in public places in California in the 90’s and I quit smoking in 1996. My reason wasn’t because of the ban in public places, but it was because they were raising the price of cigarettes to force people to quit. I eventually did quit when I was so disgusted by the horrible taste of the generic cigarettes. I gained 50lbs almost immediately and have gained another 50 since then which has led to sleep apnea and diabetes. Losing weight is not easy when you don’t have the money to pay for the expensive diet food and gym memberships. I am too heavy for my bike now and have back and knee problems, so exercising isn’t as easy as it used to be.

And yes I have heard it all.  If you’re fat, just quit eating.  Sure smart ass.  It’s so easy for people to tell me that because they aren’t fat.  They have no idea how hard it is to lose weight.  It takes 10 seconds to eat a cupcake, but the fat from that cupcake will stay with me forever.

I think if the government is going to step in and start telling people what they can and cannot drink and eat, they need to make it easier for people to lose weight by bringing down the high cost of the healthy foods, and stop making it so easy to get fat.  Get rid of the dollar menu on the unhealthy foods and allow us fat people who are trying to lose weight eat healthy foods.  Make the veggie burgers less expensive at the grocery store, help bring the cost of vegetables down and all the other health foods.  Make it easier on us instead of just banning things.

Children do the opposite of what they are told, so if you tell us “adults” that we can’t have more than 16oz, we’re just gonna buy 2 to spite you.  That you can count on.

Homemade Dog Food

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily Blog1 Comment

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of homemadedogfood.com for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

Do you know what is in your dog's food?  Do your dogs even like their food?  Go look at the ingredients on the bag of dog food, you can only pronounce a few words.  What's frustrating for me is that no matter what brand or flavor dog food, my dog won't even eat it unless it is her last resort.

I have a friend who is a chef who told me many years ago that she has a recipe for dog food, but I didn't have a dog so I didn't really pay too much attention.  Now that I have a dog, it's time to find out how to do it so I turn to this website Homemade dog food.  Not only do they have a recipe my dog will eat, but it only has a few ingredients. Ground beef, rice and eggs that you bake like meatloaf.  What more can you ask for?

Check out this Easy cooked dog food recipe.  They are very precise and to the point and even have pictures and a video in case you are unclear how to do it.  The chef also shows how much of the supplements to add when he feeds it to his dogs.  And look at the dogs eating this food, look at those tails wagging.  Those are some happy dogs.  I know my dog would much prefer to eat this dog food.

Take a minute and think about something.  When you see animals in the wild, you don't see them eating hard round nuggets or bone shaped food, instead they eat raw meat from animals they have killed.  That's what your dog wants, but of course they can't go out and kill their dinners because there isn't any game in your house for them to hunt.  This recipe gives them the meat they desire and the added supplements they require that they aren't getting from the cooked hamburger meat.  I know that this is what my dog would love to eat so I am seriously thinking about making her food.

It says in the website to fast your dog for 24 hour to flush out the dog food, well my dog doesn't eat her food, she eats people food which I know isn't good for her, so she doesn't have to flush anything, she can go right ahead and switch to this new diet.  This also makes it easier to add worm medicine to her food.  I hate having to go out and buy wet dog food just to add medicine to it, I can just add it to her regular meals now.

From now on I don't have to share my dinner with her cause she will have her own.  She's happy, I'm happy, we're all happy and that is what it's all about.

AstroBrights Back To School Crafts #goastrobrights

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily BlogLeave a comment

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Astrobrights Papers by Neenah Paper for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

Astrobrights Paper

Do you remember when you were in school and the only colored paper you had was construction paper?  They were huge thick sheets of textured paper that you had to cut down to get normal sized sheets.  Sometimes they were smaller, but they were typically about the size of your desk.  Don't get me wrong, I loved construction paper, but it's nice to have normal sized 8 1/2 x 11 paper to print on when you need to.

AstroBrights paper is not construction paper, it's premium bright colored paper that you can actually put into your printer for school projects, book reports, after school chore list, PTA meetings, flyers for your lost dog/cat or you can cut to any shape and size you want for scrap booking.  What I most love is that, ok you are going to laugh.  Remember those things we used to make that were called fortune tellers?  We'd fold them up and then stick our fingers in and open wide then lengthwise and we would spell the color name, then choose a number and open and close it for that number of times then read our fortune?  Well, we had to use lined school paper and sometimes get in trouble for wasting paper.  This paper is perfect for that.  But I digress.

You can support your local school with the "Give a Brighter Year Sweepstakes" with a cash prize and school supplies valued at $30,000 for the school of your choice.  Check out AstroBrights papers on Facebook for more information.  It's easy, under their Timeline banner you will see 2 boxes that say Sweepstakes and Contest.

They also have a contest called "Make Something Astrobrights."  Unleash your creativity for a chance to win Astrobrights paper and other prizes.  All you need to do is click Contest on the Facebook page (link above) and share your unique project on pinterest and twitter using hashtag #goastrobrights.  It's fun, you know you want to do it.  First prize is a Visa gift card.  Just make something and have fun with it.

Astrobrights is available at Target, Amazon, Staples, Office Depot, Office Max and Walgreens.  I looked it up on Amazon and found it for $20 for 500 sheets.  I mean come on, that's a lot of paper for that tiny amount.  You could buy 2 packages and keep one for yourself and give the other to your local elementary school.  I'm sure they could use it.

Have lots of fun making those fortune tellers, I wonder if I can remember how to make one lol.

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