May The Fourth Be With You

Independence Day is a great day to watch Independence Day.

Most families have their own holiday traditions. At Christmas at our house, it’s serving specific dishes for dinner. At Thanksgiving, it’s having a smoked ham.

At some point over the last decade, watching the movie “Independence Day” has become our Fourth of July tradition.

We usually grill something, thank the Good Lord for our country, and then sit down to watch Will Smith fight aliens.

It’s a good time.

However, I miss the old Fourth ...

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Charge It

We bought an electric car.

First, let me say that I do not consider myself a hippie, tree hugger, environmental whacko, or anything of the sort. But I do believe that being a good steward of my little piece of Mother Nature is the responsible thing to do.

And being a cheapskate helps. Buying less fuel is always nice.

In 2003, my wife and I bought our first hybrid car. Cars that were both gasoline and electric were not common then. I considered ...

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Say What?

“You can’t make this stuff up.”

Actually, you can.

“These are mostly highway miles.”

Ever had a car salesman say that to you? It’s one of the many lines we’ve been trained to accept as fact.

I’ve never asked an Impala if its life has been an easier one simply because a little old lady from Pasadena drove it to church on the freeway each Sunday instead of a city street, but I’m guessing that a mile is a mile is a mile.

Why is ...

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The Door To Our Past Is A Jar

We buy a lot of food that we used to make ourselves.

Consumerism has made the world a better place, but it’s also made us quite lazy. What we used to be forced to make at home for economic reasons, we now, generally, just go and buy.

Last week, I made what was by my own count, the second loaf of bread in my life. Granted, I used a bread machine and didn’t knead the dough by hand, but it was still ...

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TV Or Not TV? That is the question.

Remember when we had three TV channels with decent programming?

Now I have cable TV and still only have about three TV channels with decent programming.

Recently, the cable company called me to tell me that they detected that my cable signal was weak and that it needed to be fixed.

I have to hand it to them. It wasn’t so long ago that trying to get any TV provider to answer the phone when you had a problem was virtually impossible. So, ...

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