Randy Ingle

It really does pay to know some one who can help with your PC issues. I have become spoiled by our ITs at work that are at our beck and call when ever a computer problem rears its ugly head. They aren’t always as quick about it as I’d like but at least they do what they can, with what they have. Budget cutbacks have made their department a nightmare to work for, so I have to cut them some slack in that area.

I enjoy picking their brains when I have the chance to. They know all about dedicated server issues, the best managed hosting information and colocation particulars that most people, like me, know little or nothing about. We have a few people in our family that are pretty good with computers but they are always busy or have an attitude (this family is always having an attitude with somebody) and can’t always be counted on.

I wish that I had had the insight, back in the days of choosing a profession/occupation to have gone to computer school. There will always be a need for computer help, just like there will always be a need for an Undertaker, depressing but so true.

My wife has been on a mission to find comfortable shoes for at least the past year. She decided that a good place to shop for comfortable shoes would be a store that sells medical uniforms. After all, she reasoned, most of the people who work in the medical field and wear nursing uniforms are probably on their feet most of the day and have found the secret to comfortable shoes.

So she tells me that she is looking for a local place that sells nursing uniforms and medical scrubs and wants me to go with her to check out whether they have good comfortable shoes that she can wear to work. I agreed to go with her, but mainly to try to keep her from spending a fortune on ugly shoes!

I’m pretty handy around the place and I can do a variety of jobs myself in order to save money rather than calling in a professional. But this morning when the basement flooded with raw sewage, it was time to call a plumber. The sewage pump that I had only purchased less than a year ago stopped working and what a nasty mess I had to deal with!

One of the challenges of living here in Maine is maintaining our rural mailboxes. In the winter, many mail boxes are struck by snow plows as the plows are clearing the roads of snow and ice. And when that happens, the boxes don’t just lean over a little bit, they are usually completely knocked down. When that happens, the rural mail carrier cannot deliver the mail to those Residential Mailboxes. So then the poor sap has to go to the Post Office to pick up their mail.

There have been times when I’ve gone to a Fair and seen a few vendors who try to sell snow-plow proof mailboxes. Their products do look like they could withstand the snow plow, but they are expensive. I have not seen any of them on any of the roads that I drive down yet. I think that most folks around here would rather gamble on their boxes not getting hit than spend the extra money on a plow-proof box.

One of the things that bothers me a lot is how many solicitations I receive from different organizations to donate money to their cause.  Sometimes I get suspicious about the organization and ask for information about the organization.  One of the reasons for that is I often get phone calls from organizations that say they support the local police department, but when I contact the local police about the solicitation they deny any knowledge of the organization.  That puts a bit of a sour taste in my mouth when it comes to responding to requests for donations.

So when I was asked to donate money to the Orchid Recovery Center Charities, I was suspicious.  I had never heard of The Orchid Recovery Charities.  So I spent a little bit of time online to check out the Orchid Recovery Center and see what they are about.  I found that the Center is a rehab center for women, located in Florida.  So far the only charity I found that is involved with them is a charity named Kiva.  Kiva lends money to poverty stricken entrepreneurs, to help them pull themselves out of poverty.  That sounds like a good cause, don’t you think?

I just heard about the big pilot strike at Spirit Airlines today.  I’m sure glad that I don’t have any plans to be flying anywhere with that airline – I’d be totally outraged about being stranded.  I understand that the other airlines are not honoring the prices that the travelers paid for their Spirit tickets, and the travelers are having to pay through the nose to get onto other flights.  I’ve been stranded for short periods at various airports due to bad weather or flights being cancelled, and I have to say that airports are not very comfortable places to be stranded in!  I guess this is just one more example why I prefer to drive when I go on vacation – I don’t have to worry about cancelled flights or any workers going on strike!

With all of the defeats going on with the attempts to plug the gushing oil in the Gulf of Mexico, and the news of how it is reaching the shore, and into the marshes, I started to wonder what in the world will happen if this stuff catches on fire? With hurricane season upon us, is this going to spread the pollution even more?

I wonder if the experts at BP have even called in outside experts to try to help with this problem. I am very disappointed that every attempt to stop the gushing oil has failed. I have to wonder if it will ever be contained or will it just keep gushing until the well runs dry.

I’m always amazed when I hear about a friend of mine that passed away.  I’m not that old, yet it seems that every few months someone else that I know has passed away.  Some from illness, some from accidents.  Fortunately for their families, most of them have good life insurance policies to help their loved ones to keep their lives intact.

My wife and I have been reviewing our coverage and have been thinking about getting some term life insurance quotes.  The economic times are still too shaky for either one of us to feel comfortable without that safety net.  In addidition to funeral insurance I want to get mortgage insurance.  If something happens to either one of us, I don’t want the other one to lose the house.  That would truly be devestating!

Guest post by Linda Bradshaw

When my hubby was injured in my car accident in 2007, I tried to get my mortage company for our house in New England that we were trying to sell to grant me a hardship forebearance. Since he wasn’t able to work due to my injuries, I was hopeful to get some empathy from the company. Boy, was I wrong!

Long story short, the mortgage company has dropped the ball and tossed me around from department to department, where I have been met with gross incompetence at every turn.

After over two years, even though we FINALLY did a deed-in-lieu with the company last November, and the deed to the house was transferred into their name in December the company is continuing to send me notices that I owe them the money and the company is still sending notices to the credit agencies that the mortgage is overdue. This is resulting in credit card companies closing my credit cards or lowering my credit limits.

Every time I call Bank of America I am shuttled around from department to department, and told the matter will be escalated and someone will call me back within the next week. That never happens. I have called them about once every two weeks, and nothing is resolved. I have sent them letters, and I get replies that someone will contact me within 20 days, and that never happens either! I got collection calls several times a day for years on end until I finally blocked their telephone number!

As of today, I have been on the phone with Bank of America for the past four hours, being shuttled around from department to department, trying to find some help. I’m on hold at the moment, waiting for a supervisor to talk to me. The lady I just spoke with said that my account was in the process of being assigned to someone in the home retention department!

I have contacted my state senator Mark Warner’s office, asking for help a couple of weeks ago. Haven’t heard back from them yet.

Anyone know a good lawyer that would like to sue this company on my behalf to get this resolved and maybe some punitive damages for emotional distress it is causing? I had hired a lawyer that I was told is an agressive lawyer that loves to sue people, but for some reason he just doesn’t seem to be in the mood to take this on! If you know of a class-action suit going on for people in situations like this, or know a good lawyer that could/would help me, please post comment to this blog and I’ll get the information!

Can you feel my pain?

My brother-in-law in a total computer geek.  That’s a good thing to be in this day and age!  Every time my wife decides that she has outgrown her computer, she talks with her brother about what she should get, and how much she should expect to pay for it.  Even though he lives more than 800 miles away from us, she calls him every time she has trouble with anything related to software or hardware. 

I can remember one day coming home from work and my wife was telling me that she was having some kind of trouble with the computer.  She had been re-booting it a few times, trying to get it to fix itself, but to no avail.  So after supper she called her brother and told him she was stumped, and needed his help.  Fortunately he had some remote desktop software that he sent her that allowed him to look at our computer without even leaving his house.  It was very strange to watch as he took over control of the computer from 800 miles away!

We watched, fascinated, as the cursor moved across the screen, as if an invisible hand was moving the mouse.  Every now and then he called the house and told my wife to reboot the computer and let him sign back on again.  It only took him about an hour to fix the problem, and my wife was thrilled!  She hated the thought of having to break down the computer into its separate components and taking it to the repair shop for them to keep it for a week before even looking at it!

I don’t know which I hate the most – black flies or mosquitoes!  They both will annoy me to no end!  May is beautiful, but it is tempered with the aggravation of black flies.  I’ve found, though, that if I try to do my work outdoors in the cool of the morning that they don’t bother me.  Black flies like the hotter part of the day.  Only rarely do the actual biting hurt me – it’s the swarming around the head that drives me crazy!  I’ve tried a variety of insect repellents, and I think that the Deep Woods Off does the best all-around job for ticks, biting flies, and mosquitoes.  I also like Ben’s 100, but I haven’t seen that in a spray that I can apply on my clothes.

My wife says that all of the repellents give her skin a chemical burn so she wears the netted hats and long sleeves when she has to be outside.  Sometimes I forget that the chemicals burn her and I’ll give her a hug and a kiss; before I know it she is running to the sink to wash off the area that we touched because she says her skin is burning!  It must be tough to have that kind of skin sensitivity!

With April 15th looming so close there are a lot of unhappy tax payers who are trying to find a way to pay Uncle Sam his just dues. Even with all of the tax credits that have come out recently there are a lot of people who aren’t getting a refund and need to send in a check along with their paperwork.

My sister is one of those people and she has had to take out a personal loan in order to take care of her situation. This has broken her heart because she has never had to deal with borrowing money and all that goes along with the process before. She has always paid cash and has had great credit up until last year. The economy has taken it’s toll on everyone it seems.

But she did go online and found a website moneynowusa.com that made the process an easier one to take on. They had her taken care of in about an hour and she is on her way to the post office tomorrow to get in it the mail and post marked by the 15th along with everyone else that has waited until the last minute to get their filing issues done.

I’m worried, however, that this is an ominous omen for her financial future. Personal loans like this can be a problem if not paid off quickly!

We have a local ice cream parlor that has been doing a booming business since opening the first of April. The parking lot is always full, actually over flowing with cars and people standing in lines waiting for one of their ice cream treats. It’s good to see some one making money.

A couple of years ago a good friend of mine moved from Maine to Virginia. He had a hard time finding affordable moving trucks and ended up renting a one-way rental truck where he had to pack it and drive it. I don’t think that the ABF U-Pack Moving service was available up here at that time. If it had been, it sure would have been a lot easier for him to move because they would have delivered a truck to him to pack, and then they would have done the driving. If I ever have to move, I think I’ll be using their service – it sounds like a good plan.

I am lucky to have a very large, but very close family. In this very impersonal world it is nice to know that family is there for you no matter what and that you can count on them when the going gets tough. With the economy in such a mess there is a lot of scary things going on for many people and their families. Back in the day it wasn’t uncommon for many generations to live under the same roof and it seems that this is once again becoming a necessity for many families.

A cousin of mine has finally landed himself a good job, after being unemployed for over a year now. He has to re locate to Oklahoma City for the position, so he is busy trying to find a few decent Oklahoma City Luxury Apartments to check into via the Internet. He and his wife have been living with her parents during his time of being unemployed and they are so excited to be able to once again be on their own and in their home in the near future.

Luxuryapartmentshop.com is one of the websites that they have been utilizing recently. This is a very user friendly site that assists with the search of the many Luxury Apartments that are available all across the country. Just a few short key strokes and bingo all types of choices pop up for your review. It also has a Resource Center to assist with other moving issues that can be helpful during this stressful time of relocating. You can get a Free Credit Score, a Free Credit Consultation along with some Free ID Protection, which is a big issue these days. You can also find some moving tips that might help along the way, any help during this time has to be welcomed.

I wish them all the luck in the world. I’m going to miss them both. We have been close since grade school and his wife is a doll baby and they will make some good looking kids when the right time comes to start their own family. Hopefully this new job will make it so that they can afford to start one soon.

With all of today’s high tech involved in our daily lives it is important to keep up to date with so many computer issues. Spyware, virus protection, colocation plans and dedicated servers are all very necessary to keep our information safe and secure. Businesses need the best managed hosting that they can get their hands on and there are a lot of options out there to choose from these days.

My sister is starting her own small business later this year and has been researching many of these necessities, being as pro active as she can, while she can. She is a whiz on the computer but still has a lot to learn.  I do believe that she will do well in her endeavors. It take a lot of guts to start any type of business during these uncertain economic times.

As for me, well, I’ll just keep on doing what I’ve been doing and hope for the best. The great weather is making a difference in people’s attitudes and there just might be a light at the end of the tunnel at some point.

I forgot to mention that while I was flea marketing over the weekend, I found out that one of my favorite markets will be closing down soon. It seems that something happened to the owner and now the whole deal is up for sale. What a bummer, it is a great market that has been around for a very long time. I always enjoy the people that I meet there and have found some really good pieces from time to time.

I enjoy going to the various flea markets that we have around here. Over the weekend I stopped at a few, found a few good deals and some treasures to take back home. It was a great weather weekend, so a lot of people were out and about taking advantage of it all.

When I was in college I was surprised to learn that less than 2% of the American population owned Stocks!  One of the reasons it surprised me was that is one of the definitions of wealth.  Supposedly if you have enough money to invest in stocks, then you are not considered “poor.”  As a result of that lesson, I became interested in Stock Trading and opened up a couple of IRA Accounts for myself and my wife.

Since then I’ve started to do my investing with my computer, online.  I found that getting an Online Broker was not very difficult at all.  You just have to be careful to check out all of the fees because some of them charge more than others.  I found that Online Trading is beneficial to me because I can do it at my own convenience, and the sales can be done quickly; wherease with the broker I used to have I had to wait several days to get my money into or out of my stocks.  I like fast!

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I was really surprised this morning when Brad walked into the Market today.  Jerry, Shane, Bob and I were drinking our coffee and talking about the latest gossip (I mean man talk) as we usually do every morning when Brad came in.  I hadn’t seen Brad all winter long!  I thought he had moved to warmer climates! 

I almost didn’t recognize him at first – he looked a lot more muscular than I’ve ever seen him before!  Jerry asked what he had been up to and Brad replied “Power 90.”  Apparently Brad got involved in an Insanity Workout program in an attempt to build up his physique!  I’d have to say that it looks like it worked!  He grinned and told us that we should try it too!  Well, I’m not inclined to be interested in anything that has the word “Insanity” in it!  I think a Slim in 6 workout program is much more my speed!