Leigh's Views

Now I’m not one to willing use technology.   Thus, I’m not usually the right person to ask when something goes wrong with something high tech.   Fine, I’m okay with that.   So, I was over at an older friend’s house the other day.   She made the innocent mistake of asking me if I knew how to operate a robot vacuum cleaner.   Yikes, I’m the last person to ask.   But, I’m not one to ever say no to someone in need of help.  Okay, she turns the thing on.   It spins around a few times.   And then tries to commit suicide.   I’m not kidding here.   It kept banging itself against the wall, over and over again.   Finally, its little dust tray fell out and it gave a horrendous beep and stopped.   Did it succeed?   I was almost afraid to go anywhere near the thing to find out.   I was concerned there were more of its parts and innards on the floor.   Or worse yet, I would find parts in its dust tray because it had eaten itself.   As casually as I could I asked my friend if the robot always did

This weekend was supposed to be a fun, stress-free time.   I had friends visiting, people I hadn’t seen in a few years.   But instead of being able to relax, I ended up dealing with another issue that came up at the worst possible time.   My focus became split and I wound up distracted much of the weekend.   Thus, after my friends left Sunday afternoon, I was feeling the need to vent.   There’s a project I never finished this spring.   Normally, I would never leave a project undone that long because things like that drive me nuts.   However, this particular task would’ve required me to spend quite a bit of time in the sun.   T hus, I’d decided to wait to late fall or winter to finish it since it wasn’t a priority.   But given the way I was feeling Sunday, it seemed just the thing.   Yet, out there in the heat and humidity, drowning in sweat, I wasn’t feeling any better.   The bells from the ice cream truck kept haunting me as he drove around and around the neighborhood.   After abo

Dreams, reality, how do you draw the line between them to make them real?   Just jump in and do the thing you’ve always wanted?   Spend forever and a day making a plan for how to make it a reality?   Wait and hope it will come true?   There are times in our lives we can’t make things work out the way we want.   It’s just a simple fact of being an adult, being responsible, being human.   There are other times we hesitate for too long and then it becomes too late to act.   When should we say, ‘Capre diem, I’m doing this no matter what!’?   Well, I’ve been doing a lot of traveling over the past few years.   Because I want to.   Sometimes with a friend or two.   Sometimes by myself.   Now, I’m going to embark on a big trip alone.   To Spain.   I was hoping a friend would come with me but it’s not to be.   For this person, dreams and reality don’t seem compatible anymore.   It’s sad really.   The only thing holding him back is his own fears.   Fine, I’ll take lots of pictures and when I g

I was talking to a young friend of mine who got married this summer.   She asked me if I knew what the line was between being attentive and being a stalker.   Uhm, whoa, hold up here a second.   What in the world was she talking about?   This definitely needed some explanation before I could answer the query.   Turns out her new husband asks her what she’s doing every five seconds.   If she goes to stand up, he asks her where she’s going.   If her phone rings he instantly asks who it is.   He goes through her mail.   He sits there and stares at her when she’s folding the laundry, making dinner, washing the dishes.   Sure, there were some nice things as well.   If her glass was empty he would refill it without asking.   He buttered her toast in the morning.   However, overall, it was starting to drive her nuts.   Nevertheless, she hadn’t said anything to him, yet.   She wasn’t sure if he was being overly attentive or was a borderline creepy stalker.   Yikes, all I could think was, ‘Pl

Over the years I’ve spent a lot of hours doing financial counseling.   Not getting it but giving it.   Mostly to young couples and single moms who are getting ready to make the leap into first time home ownership.   So when an older person asked for my help with a financial matter, I gladly said I’d be happy to.   She had tried to apply for a credit card online.   She got this message at the end which she didn’t understand and wrote it down to show to me.   She had a general idea of her credit score, thus felt it would be no problem getting this new card.   I took one look at the message and asked when the last time she’d reviewed her credit report.   Never was her quick reply.   Ruh-roh, who knows what kinds of discrepancies may be on the thing.   Based on the message saying the company needed more info to make a decision, I was almost afraid of what might be on there.   A few quick minutes on a few websites and we had our answer.   Most of her personal info was incorrect or old and

So I got this call the other day.   It was from my former insurance company, they were wanting to know some info about my car and current address.   Problem is, I don’t own a car, my son does.   However, it appears he never updated the insurance to his name when he turned 18.   Well, gee, thanks.   Fine, I can handle this.   As politely as I could, I told the man on the phone, “Not my problem.   Talk to my son.”   He stammered, stuttered.   It was clear he hadn’t expected this response from me.   “Uhm, we have your number not his.   This could cause problems with the insurance.”   Okay then, this man needs to understand a few things.   Like, does his mom handle his insurance?   Unlikely.   “Adulting is hard.   But again, not my problem.”   So I hang up, text my son to call his insurance.   Hey, at least I did that much.   I was tempted to not do anything.   After all, my son turned 18 almost 2 years ago.   Yes, that’s right, 2 years ago not 2 days ago.   At the time, I had given hi

I’ve been way too busy and stressed for several weeks now.   I guess I didn’t realize the toll it was taking on me until today.   How, you might ask, did I figure this out?   Well, I went to do laundry.   Not like I really had the time to do laundry, but I seemed to be running out of almost everything.   Which made no sense because the pile in the basket didn’t seem to be that big.   All was going fine until I went to throw the load in the dryer and realized the load from last week was still in there.   Oh my.   Yikes, that explains a lot.   Ugh, wrinkled clothes galore.   But wait, I’m a woman.   We’re supposed to be the masters of multitasking.   Able to juggle 250 things at a time and still leap tall buildings in a single bound.   So there I was, putting a wet washcloth in the dryer as I turned it on for the second time with the load from the previous week.   Hoping in vain that it would work, the wrinkles would come out of everything so I wouldn’t have to rewash or worse – iron.

So I was having a conversation with someone the other day.   This person was convinced that every TV show and movie about XYZ city was about the neighborhood she was raised in.   And by extension showed a certain ethnic group which she happened to be part of in a bad light.   My initial reaction was she was delusional and I made the mistake of telling her so.   I explained this was like saying that every TV show, movie and book about Rome could only focus on the Trevi Fountain.   Forget Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel, the beautiful piazzas, the Vatican, pasta, pizza, well you get the idea.   It’s not possible, unrealistic and just plain stupid.   Well, this started her on a 2 hour rant about how I was wrong because I was from Podunk holler.   And thus by extension know nothing.   Fine, tell me I’m stupid just because of where I was born and raised.   But I was so sure I was right after she left I decided to prove it.   I watched a few selected episodes of several of the TV shows she m

I was at the grocery store the other day.   I walked around the corner to where two male employees were stocking shelves.   I overheard one say to the other, “I don’t dance alone and I never dance with a man.”   Uhm, okay.   TMI.   I only wanted to grab some pickles.   I quickly made my presence known by saying, “I think I missed something important in this conversation.”   The guy who had made the statement laughed and replied, “Anything I can help you with?”   I just nodded no.   But it got me to thinking, in this day and age was this an okay thing to say in public?   Because, let’s face it, it seems like you look at someone sideways anymore and you can find yourself facing a lawsuit.   Now don’t get me wrong, there are some legit complaints being made.   However, have we reached the point that there is no such thing as an innocent comment or joke anymore?   Should I have been highly offended and upset by this remark?   I’ve never been a shrinking violet, so no, I wasn’t even fazed

So I’ve written a few posts now about bad customer service.   A friend of mine called me to tell me about an experience she had.   I decided to share it here in the hopes that this won’t happen to anyone else.   Okay, she went to the dentist a few months ago.   When she was finished she noticed there was a hole between two molars.   However, the dentist didn’t mention it.   He did mention a couple of other issues, thus she decided it must not be a big deal and decided to ignore it.   Well, a few weeks ago she started to have pain.   Since food has been getting stuck in the hole since her last appointment, her initial thought was something was stuck she hadn’t been able to get out.   But after a few days, she realized this wasn’t the problem.   Fine, she makes another appointment with the dentist.   At the dentist’s they tell her a filling is chipped and they didn’t do it.   She politely explains again (since she had told them when she first got in there the same thing) how when she w