Cops Gone Wild...

I just read in our local Sunday newspaper, The Charleston Gazette, that two of my hometown cops are in trouble for an alleged attack on two citizens during a routine traffic stop. One cop got fired for insubordination and the other is on administrative leave for being accused of using unnecessary force to restrain the motorists. The incident was reportedly racially motivated. I don't know how it all started, but this supposedly routine traffic stop stopped quickly escalated to an all-out brawl. The newspaper reported that both the driver and passenger of the car had to be transported to the hospital after first making a stop a City Hall. The driver, Lauren Reynolds, alleges that one of the policeman, Patrolman Matthew Leavitt, licked her on the neck and asked her "is that how you like it you little whore?" He claims that she was fighting him and pulling at his gun belt. Her husband, Twan Reynolds, alleges that his cornea was ripped when he was beat with the officer's nightsticks and his elbow was chipped while he was being stomped. Patrolman Leavitt claims that Mr. Reynolds came lurching out of the car when the officers asked his wife to step out. The officers had seen a half empty bottle of Vodka in the back seat and said that their intention was to give the driver, Mrs. Reynolds a Breathalyzer Test. Leavitt further alleges that another cop on the scene refused to help get the subject under control. Tests report that the Breathalyzer Test failed to indicate that the driver had been drinking. The Gazette reported that Mrs. Reynolds accused Leavitt of asking "Don't you know who owns this town? Well, your getting ready to learn." Now, I'm surely not a lawyer, but it all sounds like a big ole lawsuit to me. Oh, yeah...the mayor, who is also the town magistrate will be hearing the case to decide whether or not any wrong-doing took place. I know one thing-I would be asking for an outside, independent agency in a case like this.

Newman's Legacy

Today is a sad day in Hollywood with the passing of Paul Newman. He was one of my favorite actors. He wasn't just an actor, though. He was the faithful husband of 50 years to Joanne Woodward, a philanthropist, an outspoken civil rights advocate and so much more to all of his fans the world over. He will be surely be missed. 'Newman's Own', his gourmet foods company, has donated 100s of millions to charities. Some of my favorite movies that he starred in were Cool Hand Luke, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and The Color of Money. He's gone but certainly will never be forgotten - his legacy lives on in the millions of people who have been positively impacted by his life and love for others.

Appetizer anyone?

I haven't had as much time to post lately because I've been working on some freelance writing assignments. Yay me!!! I just wanted to pop in so everyone would know that I'm still around. I also wanted to say that I received a heads up on a great offer today from TGI Fridays. I found a post over at Work at Home Mom Revolution pointing me to a coupon. Hurry and get yours. The coupon is only good until Oct. 10, 2008 and is good for one appetizer, valued up to $8.00. TGI Fridays here I come!

decisions...decisions

I wish I had someone to make all of the decisions that are popping up in my life lately. I just received a call from the lady at the school board and she wanted me to come into her office in the morning for an interview to be a long-term sub. Well, I don't have my fingerprints done yet and I haven't done my six hours of observation at the school of my choice. When I told her that I hadn't completed these tasks yet, she kind of told me, in a round-about way, "hurry up...we need help".

So, now, I have to figure out which police detachment is the least expensive to have my prints done. Some of these places charge $20 just to ink your fingers and put them on the card. Heck! I already have the card. I'm thinking about smearing some mascara on the pads of my fingers and doing it myself. On top of that $20 I have to have a $59 check to go with the fingerprint card when I go in for the interview...not to mention the $25 that I already paid to take the online class to go to their training center and be tested. Funny thing though - they don't make you do a drug screening. I guess they figure that after paying out all of the money you have put out to jump through their hoops, you wouldn't have the money to buy drugs anyway.

My regular reads...

These are some of the blogs that I read on a regular basis. Check them out. They cover an array of topics and you might find something you like!

A Little of This and That

A Peek Inside Our Life

All in a Blog

Angies Silly Stuff

Anything I Think About
Baby Luvin

Barefooted Me

Blog About it

Blog Fogg

Bloggie Mommie

Busy Bee Village

The Cajun Blogger

Cat-o-nine Tales

Chatty Chica

Claudette's Words

A Christian Marriage

Confessions of a Baltimore Housewife

Confetti by:Kateedyd

Coodas Corner

Cypress TX Mom

Da Boss And Bryguy

Dave's Blue Planet

Deal with Chronic Pain

Digital Photography Today

Domesticated Diva

Drizzly Blog

Fat Girl Goes Fit

Feelings Just Are

Five O'Clock Somewhere

Flipping Adentures

Florida Travel Spots

4 Cats Make Me Crazy!

The Fuzzbutt Files

The Geeks Girl

Godly Woman

Good News

Green 'n' Pink

Happy Healthy Families

Have Your Health

Healthy Home Blog

Here On Columbia Avenue

Hillbilly Heart

House of Bargains

House Wife Wom

Huckle Buckle and Other Mom Stuff

A Hunter's Wife

I Don't Commute

I Love My 3 Boys

It's Just My Thoughts

Jolly Mom

Kateedyd What?!

Kimmi's Krazy World

Kim's Kountry Kitchen

KKB Mom of 3

Kookie Krumblez

Lipgloss N" Pinups

Lisa‘s Command Post

Luxury Lifestylez

Making My American Dream

Mama and Hustler???

Mia's Menu Mania

Mia's Motivation

Mindals Musings

Mindy Making Sense

Mix World

Mad Mommy

Moma's Crazy World

Moma's Life

Mommie’s Marbles

Mommy Mia's World

Mom Tidings

Mom to Three Sisters

Mom to Tweens

Moon Babyz

Ms Frugal McDougal

My Big Fat Battle

My First Steps With Jesus

My-Junk-Drawer

My So Called Blog

My Name is Not “Mom”

My Song of Joy

My Wahm Life

My Weekly Beef

Notes From a Wannabe WAHM

Not Just In Your Head

101 Ways to Save

Pamela-te-da

Paradise Fiber Studio

Photos for the Fun of it

Postcard from Somewhere

Pure Jade Home

Raising a Girl

Remotely Mommy

Saving with Style

Saving With Tracy

Savvy Business Moms

Secola‘s Space

Secret Thoughts and More

Shrinking Pamelalala

SlickMom

Something Witty to Say

Success Factors

Surgical Nurse Musings

Talk Time with Kim

teleTwenties

That‘s What I am Talking About

The Jolly Kitchen

Three Times a Brideamaid
Thrifty Momma Ramblings

Thrifty Thoughts

Time Keeps on Flying
Totally TV!

Vibrant Healthy U

Wahm Adventures

WAH and Loving It

WICBlog

The Work From Home Blog

Work from Home Options

World of Homemaking

World of Mom

dancin' with a potty mouth

Did you see 'Dancing with the Stars' last night? Who knew Chloris Leachman would spew a string of profanities the way she did when the judges scored her? Great day lady! Have some respect for live tv! I do think that she is hilarious though. I watched her on Bonnie Hunt's new daytime show and she was a hoot. Bonnie kept telling her not to get close to the edge of the stage because she was afraid that Chloris would fall, which made Leachman a little mad. She went and pranced around the edge and laid on the floor just to spite Bonnie. Wow! I hope I'm that agile when I'm 82. I didn't think she danced bad at all to be an octogenarian. I guess the judges expect more even at that age! We'll see tonight who gets booted. I bet it will be Susan Lucci. She only scored 14 which really surprised me...not that the score surprised me, but I thought she would be a better dancer. Sorry Erica! I still love ya, though!

Fall in for a bowl of soup...

It's official! Soup weather is here. With the first day of fall on today's calendar it is the perfect time to enjoy a steaming, hot bowl of soup to chase away that brisk fall chill. I think that we've had pretty unseasonably warm weather for this time of year. It was, however, pretty nippy outside this morning at 7 a.m. when I put CJ on the bus. Today's dinner was a nice big pot of Taco Soup, courtesy of Kathy S. over at The Recipe Zaar. I love this website and use it more than any other cooking website on the internet. What I really like about it is that users rate the dishes, so you know before you start a recipe about how well it is going to turn out and how it can be tweaked for optimum performance, etc. The soup turned out delicious, as always. We top it with shredded cheese, sour cream and throw in a few tortilla chips for good measure.

I'm getting so excited about seeing the changes that fall always brings. That is what I love about living in this valley. Soon I'll be able to look up in any direction and see all the colors of God's palette in these hills. It is breathtaking! And then there's Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas all falling in line. Time to get busy! I may just need another bowl of that soup to fortify me!

Another pedophile is off the streets...

Former pastor Paul D. Smeltzer of Scott Depot pleaded guilty Wednesday to three counts of sexual assault. This is the pervert that molested three of his nieces and his stepdaughter while videotaping it. He will supposedly serve at least 17 but no more than 45 years for these crimes. It's not long enough. He needs to spend the rest of his life behind bars for the psychological damage he has caused these young girls. Unfortunately his involvement with the ministry has allowed him to have contact with youth for most of this decade. He was a director of children's ministry at Calvary Chapel Mira Mesa in California before he came to West Virginia. It is a sad, sad shame when people use the church and Christianity as a cover in order to perpetrate heinous acts against children. Jesus said in the bible that what you have done unto the least of these you've done unto him. He must be very distraught right now.

Pratt Elementary Welcomes LaBonte

Bobby LaBonte received a big hillbilly welcome from the City of Pratt, WV today. LaBonte was in attendance at the Grand Opening of Pratt Elementary's new playground which was made possible with a $15,000 award from Hamburger Helper, LaBonte's sponsor. The acting mayor presented the race car legend with a plaque that held the key to the city.

The tall man on the left hand side that is cut off is Mr. Anderson, the principal.

All in all in was a fun afternoon. The pta sold wristbands for autographs and 24 lucky participants got to race remote control cars with Bobby LaBonte. The money that was raised will be used to finish some work that needs to be done on the playground. Now I can say I've been in the presence of a Nascar driver. To be honest I didn't even know who he was. I was snapping shots of the man that was leading him in, which I guess was his manager or something. That's him below in the white Cheerios polo.

One of the local radio stations was there, 96.1 (the wolf) and the kids had a blast dancing with their mascot.

So, we ate free ice cream, saw a legend, danced with a wolf and came home with a free hamburger helper t-shirt. You can't beat that for good ole' hillbilly entertainment.

I don't know what he was doing here but he looks as if he is reaching up to touch the reporter's face.

Claim your money!

I ran across this website that helps connect folks with money that is due them. The site is missingmoney.com . Apparently there is a database of unclaimed monies kept and you can go there and put your name and state in to check and see if any money is due to you. Sometimes people have utilities deposits and such that should have been refunded to them that they don't know about. I saw a couple on there where McDonalds owed people money so I guess that might be where they didn't pick up their final check or something. I put my name as well as the names of all of my family members in, but nothing came up. Anyway, mosey on over there and see if you have any missing money!

wordle.net

I found the neatest website! It's called wordle and it is oodles of fun to play with. You go to their website and copy and paste text into a box, then click save and it turns it into a colorful graphic. The words that appear the most in your text will be the largest words on the page. You can change the final layout and font until you get it just the way that you want it to be. I copied and pasted the description from this website and this is the final result:

...pretty neat, huh? This would be something that I would allow my students to use in the classroom - maybe as an option with a writing assignment.

I got an award! Yay me!!!

I got a cutesy tootsy blogger award from my blogging buddy over at The Geek's Girl. Go check out her blog - she has a really neat site! Hey, being married to a geek has to have it's perks. Thanks Jen for the award!

And now I would like to bestow this esteemed award on some other hard-working bloggers, who can be found at:

1. Cooda's Corner
2. The Cajun Blogger
3. Man - I Feel Like a Woman

Congratulations ladies on some fantastic blogging!

Here are the instructions for the preceding Brillante Weblog Premio award recipients:

1. Place the logo on your blog.

2. Link to the person who awarded you.

3. You can nominate up to 5 blogs.

4. You can then add their links to your blog.

5. Leave a message in the comment section to each nominee on their blog.

McCafe anyone?

I'm so excited! I just found out that our local McDonalds is jumping on the gourmet coffee band wagon and installing the equipment to have a McCafe. I don't really drink that much coffee, but I'm excited nonetheless. Our little hillbilly corner of the world is coming up! I actually worked at this McDonalds years ago when I was in college so I still know a few of the managers. Wonder if I could pull some strings and get an extra shot of whipped cream??? Hey! You can't blame a girl for trying!

Check out Cinnamon's Giveaway

Hey blog surfers! Make sure you go to Cinnamon's giveaway page and check out the free jewelry she is having a drawing for in honor of her one month anniversary. It is a very pretty set. Don't forget to leave her some comments so that you can be entered in her drawing!

Calms Forte

Has it been a while since you've had a good night's sleep? Try Hyland's Calms Forte. It's a homeopathic formulation to relieve occasional sleeplessness. It is a 100% natural stress reliever that doesn't have the potential for side effects like so many of the prescription and over the counter sleep aids. It's safe enough for children, too. Just give half the dose. That's actually the reason that I made my initial purchase. I had been allowing my nine year old to stay up late during the summer, so when school started she had a difficult time falling asleep. Given this medication 1/2 to 1 hour prior to bedtime she relaxes and falls asleep quickly after getting tucked in. I feel very confident that Hyland's Calms Forte can give her a peaceful, restful night.

it's that time again

Ugh! The dreaded fund raiser papers have started coming home again. I'm really not a fuddy duddy and I know that the money has to come from somewhere, but good grief! Who has time to fill out all of these postcards so that friends and family can be solicited? Not to mention, said friends and family get a little ticked when they're put on the spot with a fund raiser postcard that is signed "I love you" by the child that is trying to raise money. I would rather just donate $50. I know...I know. That wouldn't be possible for everyone to do. They need to try something different, too. They are doing the same ole thing that they did eight years ago when my son was in this grade.

Schick Intuition Plus

I don't know how I survived shaving my legs for the last 30 years without this little beauty. I absolutely love the Intuition Plus razor for women. This is a triple blade razor which is surrounded by a shave bar which lathers and moisturizes, while preparing your skin for the blades. The neat thing about this razor is that the blade pivots and so does the bar. So, at any angle, the cartridge is making contact with your skin and leaving it silky soft and smooth. The razor handle has rubberized pieces on the parts that your hand touches so it doesn't slip out of your hand when it gets wet.

I first bought this to try out at Wal Mart and I think that the razor and two cartridges was around $7 or $8. I get about three uses, shaving legs and underarms, out of one cartridge and a pack of three cartridges cost around $10. Some people might think that is a little pricey, but I think it is a deal, considering the smooth shave and ease of use of this design. I don't have to worry about stinging or cutting myself because that has simply never happened since I've been using this awesome razor. Oh, yeah, it comes in several different formulas, too - one is for sensitive skin and one is for dry skin. I think there might be another one too. I'm not sure. This razor comes with a suction hanger so that you can keep it from getting wet in the tub. The Schick Intuition Plus just does an awesome job and leaves your skin feeling great! Oh, yeah - I almost forgot. Fill out this form to receive a free Schick® Intuition Plus® Soothing Moisture Razor infused with Milk & Honey!