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Continuous Chest Compression CPR

Received the link to this YouTube video in my e-mail today and found it interesting and informative.  Always good to know more ways to possibly save a life, and this beats traditional CPR which is more complicated and requires mouth-to-mouth contact.  Only drawback I see, one would have to be fairly strong and in good shape to continue chest compressions at this rate.

It’s about time, it’s about space . . .

It’s about time to stop slapping Comcast in the face.  My Comcastic affair, which is now resolved, has been given top billing for far too long (mostly due to laziness and lack of blogging inspiration on my part).  Not a full day after I published my last post, I was contacted via telephone by a Comcast representative who promised that my account would be credited and that the check would be in the mail.  The check was in fact placed in the mail, and I received it last week.  I will say that the check was not all that I had anticipated it would be, nonetheless, it was a check and I am putting the matter to rest.  Thank you Comcast! 

Oops, but one other thing . . .

Dear Comcast,

Do you think I could get some credit for all the free Google advertising I have given you on my blog as a result of mentioning your name so many times?  What?  Okay, okay . . . I had to ask.  It was worth a try, right?

Yours Truly,

A finally satisfied ex-customer

F is for Facebook and Friends

Okay, I admit it.  I’m a bit of a hermit when I’m not at work.  I like to stay home alone and have quiet, me time.  Since I don’t watch TV, finding it to be a huge waste of time, I spend time, far too much time, on the computer.  My friends enjoy teasing me, alleging that I frequent chat rooms and use my web cam for purposes that would never occur to me, but they are wrong.  Aside from building my website and blogging (and rather than the above alleged activities), I read the news, check Facebook seeking old friends and communicating with long lost relatives, do my banking, IM with family and friends and co-workers, shop till I drop, and Tweet just for amusement.  I work retail.  I love people, really I do, but I get enough face time at work so home is my haven of tranquility.  But I digress, my topic is Facebook and Friends.

This past May, I had the great privilege to reconnect with a young man I knew in college.  Oops, he’s not young anymore, but then neither am I .  He should have and me back then while he had the chance, but he was too shy and too much into his studies to have his mind distracted by a girl and I was in my own confused space.  If I had known how much guff his dorm mates had given him over his affectionate feelings toward me and our date, I might have turned the tables on him and embarrassed him by really giving them something to talk about.  Hee hee.  But that is ancient history.   Today he is in Malaysia, halfway across the world, and I am in Arizona.  Nonetheless, thanks to Facebook we chat almost every day on Windows Live Messenger just as if we had never lost touch at all and I would feel lost without his friendship in my life.  Thanks for looking me up, Philip.

Yesterday, again thanks to Facebook, I met up with my best friend from junior high, Peggy.  For several years, she and I were inseparable, joined at the hip, until our lives took their different turns, some for the worse, some for the better.  My family moved across town and changed churches and I left her and a once in a lifetime friendship behind me.  She is living in Illinois now, single, with her two pups (as she calls them) and I am a single mother of a large white rabbit named Bubbles.  Still, when we got together after all these (more than 30) years, it was as if we had never been separated, so much to talk about, so much in common.  We are already talking about me making a trip out to Illinois to visit and the possibility of her moving back to Tucson.  I hope we stay connected.  I do not want to lose her twice.  I’m so glad you took the time to find me, Peg.

So, do I spend too much time on the computer?  Um, yes!  Is it worth it?  Um, Absolutely!

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

One special day . . .

One special day. That is the title of the blog post of my dear friend, Philip, who gave me this year one of the most personal and touching birthday gifts I have ever received.  An early present because Philip is 15 hours ahead of me in time.  He marked my special day by sharing his musical talent with this special rendition of Somewhere Over the Rainbow.  Thank you, my friend, and, God willing, we shall meet someday somewhere over the rainbow.

I received this wonderful early birthday present, but my actual birthday, when it came for me 15+ hours later, went something like this:

It began as an ordinary day.  I woke up late, as usual, sped to the McDonald’s across the street for the #9, a Sausage McGriddle Meal with OJ, and an iced Hazelnut Latte.  Starving, I crammed it down hurriedly in the car and then ran upstairs to hit the shower, missing the traditional early morning birthday song call from my parents while I was gone.  They had to leave a song-a-gram.  Aside from that, I didn’t expect much from my special day as I was to spend it working and then after work getting my long overdue hair color touch up at the salon.  No birthday presents, no cakes, no candles for me, and, honestly I was okay with that.  I’m not big on celebration and ceremony.

The morning came and went with nothing spectacular but a few pleasant smiling  birthday greetings from co-workers.  At lunchtime, I wandered on over to Subway to grab my standard lunch these days, a meatball sandwich with two cookies and a Coca Cola, and headed back to the break room to eat with my boss and another co-worker.  It was during lunch that my day passed from ordinary to extraordinary. 

As I was gobbling down my sandwich, my sis and niece and nephew arrived unexpectedly bearing gifts and birthday wishes, transforming my table into a birthday party.

From my niece, an adorable handwritten note and a bunny Webkin, a girl bunny who is meant, I’m sure, to be a companion to my male rabbit, Bubbles.

From my nephew, a card that calls me old (waaaaaaaaaaah!) if I pick up the remote control and hold it to my ear and listen for a dial tone—fortunately, I rarely watch TV—and a sweet floral arrangement.  Hopefully, he’ll excuse my phone cord winding through the back of the photo.

And last, but certainly not least, a giant birthday balloon from all along with a Christmas CD I had been wanting from my sistah, who, being an adult, surely will excuse the fact that I was unable to get a good photo or scan of the CD (on second thought, probably, NOT).

Following on the heels of the departure of my sis and crew, came my hair stylist with a gynormous piece of carrot cake that had three layers and was therefore perfectly suited to divide and share with the three of us who were at the table.  What are the odds of that, eh?  And then, not too long after lunch, I was surprised by my co-workers, with a rousing rendition of the birthday song and bunch of cupcakes iced all together into a giant cupcake during our Monday afternoon meeting.  It looked like a cross between a mushroom cloud and a cupcake.  Wish I had been carrying my camera with me.  Not only that, but I was absolved of being MOD by two of my co-workers who generously took over for me in honor of my special day.

But that’s not all.  After work and a relaxing trip to the salon, I spent some enjoyable time leisurely shopping with my sister and while doing so received a call from my mother who was disappointed that she was not going to get to see me on my birthday.  What could I do but make a trip over to mom and dad’s house for a nice visit and some more lovely gifts, one of which was a lighted, magnified makeup mirror which I need desperately now that my close vision is deteriorating.  My parents also gave me two nice warm tops and a beautiful purple top that I was able to wear to work the next day. 

And so………..all in all, this was One Special Day.  I am blessed with wonderful family, friends, and co-workers!  Thank you to everyone who helped make my ordinary day extraordinary!