The movie “The Money Pit” was such a hit because so many people have sunk dollar after dollar in one home repair or home improvement project after another, in what soon becomes an sick kind of comedy of errors.

I suspect that might be the case should I ever be in a position to afford all the renovation and repair work that needs to be done on my mother’s house. Sister Big Bucks has already paid for a bathroom remodel and three vinyl replacement windows in the living room and kitchen. To be fair, that’s all that was really needed for Mother’s sake.

We’re talking major repairs still needing to be done in the rest of the house, though. Aside from replacement windows in the rest of the rooms, the laundry floor must be reconstructed. The kitchen needs redesigned. The front porch needs replacing. Obviously we need a lot more than more vinyl windows, but it would be a start…

I had a roughest day of work that I have had in the past two years since I started my current job.  I work for a medical supplies company and most days I like my job a lot but on days like today I am ready to quit.  I was packing up some CPAP equipment for a shipment that had to be sent out and it seemed like nothing was going right.

When I was finished packing up everything I found a stray sleep apnea mask and they knew that it was missing out of one of the boxes.  I started unpack everything to find out where was from as I knew it was not okay for it to be missing from the shipment.

It really sucked that I had to load and unload and reload all the CPAP machines because it made me behind in my other duties and once I get behind, it takes me forever to catch up again.  I hope tomorrow is a better day.

When I was taking all of my psychology classes and university I ended up with a huge collection of books on relationships.  At one point in my college career, I had thought that I might go on to be a marriage counselor and that is when these books would have come in handy.

Since my career choice took a whole different path I never did have any use for these books except for to loan them to friends who are having marriage difficulties, problems with their parents and so on. For me, I tend to watch and listen to Dr. Phil advice rather than read the books as they are probably getting outdated anyway.

Luckily for me, I have never really had any unhappy relationships that have warranted me reading the books and this is certainly nothing that I will ever complain about.  I have a good job, a good marriage and a good life and I could never ask for anything more.

I don’t know when doors became standard on human dwellings. Nomads transporting their “homes” wanted privacy, but a tent flap is only an illusion of privacy. Still, it does keep prying eyes out.

What’s the allure of a door? Think about it. In a house with, say, 10 rooms, if only one has a closed door, which room would you consider the most interesting? The one you can’t see into, of course.

Regardless of what’s inside other rooms, in our minds what’s behind the door conceals wonders beyond imagining.

Except the opposite can be true. When I was young I went with a friend and her dad to inspect a repossessed property. A room at the top of the stairs was locked, and my friend and I tried imagining what could be in there.

When the door was unlocked, our hopes were dashed. The walls were peeling and stained from roof leaks. I learned an important lesson at nine years old: my imagination was sometimes better than reality.

    “I am not going out with another one of your husband’s relatives, Sis, and that’s final!”

    ” You’re going to love him. This won’t be anything like the last one.”

    “You’re darn right it won’t, because I’m not going out with–”

    “I already told him you’d be here.”

    “That’s your problem, Sis. Tell him you lied.”

    “I’ll call Ma.”

    There is a pregnant silence. “That is a low blow.”

    “Desperate times, desperate measures.”

    “I am not desperate!”

    ” Well I am!. If you start dating, Mom won’t be asking me once a week when I’m going to start a family.”

    “I’m not going out with another wholesale lingerie distributor. The last guy wanted me to model his negligees.”

    “This one’s a doctor.”

    The silence is palpable. “A doctor? Not a veterinarian, but a real doctor?”

    “Stethoscope and all. But if you’re not interested…”

    “I’m…willing to try one more time. For a doctor. Oh, one thing. Do not tell Ma.”

My friend just started a new job with a company that sells promotional products.  She loves it as she finds it very entertaining and she finds that her day was very fast. She thinks that I should quit my current job and go to work for this company is well.

I have explained to her that I am quite happy at my job and though I would find it fun selling promotional items with her, it is not really what I want to be doing right now.  In fact, I am expecting to be getting a promotion and as long as I’m moving up in the company I think I will stay put.

Besides, if I left my job now I would miss out on all of the corporate gifts that I will soon receive for being at the same company for 10 years.  I have put a lot into my job, and as far as I can see, it has also given a lot to me.  I have learned a lot and I have grown as a person and it has given me the experience to get a job in this field anywhere that I want.

Our daughter’s fifth birthday celebration is one of those occasions that linger in my memory even today, and she turns twenty in just a few months. There were 8 little girls in attendance, and a few parents. Her daddy grilled the hotdogs and I did every thing else (typical, right?). Well, to give credit where it’s due, he did all the outside prep, from mowing the lawn to taking care of the deck cleaning, even though he ran out of deck cleaner before all the decking was washed.

He also bought and mounted the piñata from Hell. Imagine in the background you hear playing the 1812 Overture just where the cannons are being shot. We have it on video where I start beating it with the stick because the girls couldn’t break it. Neither could I. Finally I had to tear it open with my bare hands. I’m telling you, we should have been on America’s Funniest Home Videos. We’d have won.

For many years, we have been going on vacations in a tent.  Sure, I don’t mind camping at all, but with three kids, we have had to make our choices based on our finances.  So tenting became the way that we went on vacation, and quite honestly, our children loved it.

But, as time went on, our income increased to the point where we finally had some options when it came to taking a vacation.  Not only was this exciting, but we felt that it was time for us to give the kids a broader experience of the world.

So, our first trip in the post camping era, was to Costa Luz.  It was the most impressive trip that we had made in our lives, dazzling our eyes with amazing sights that we had never seen before.  In fact, I would even dare to say that our trip was perfect.

In fact, I think we will be hard pressed to go on a trip as amazing as last years again.  But, we have a bit of time to plan before we have holidays – I  guess we will have to see what we can come up with.

With the apparent failure of the company’s Internet marketing strategy, management has decided to outsource all of our marketing needs.  After taking care of the website marketing in-house for the past six months, our online sales are at an all-time low.

But, management didn’t want to send the business to another country – instead they wanted to find a local service that would be able to help them out.  Luckily for us, we were able to find a couple of Calgary Internet marketing firms that were interested in providing services for us.

It was decided that we were going to use an interviewing process to decide which company would have the responsibility of increasing our online sales.  We are still going through the presentations, and then the board will make a decision.

We need this process to succeed – the CEO has decided that if things don’t turn around in the next six months, we will be taking down the website permanently.

I know that most people don’t like getting flyers in their mailbox, but I love it.  You see, I just can’t wait to see all the deals and specials that are going on over the next week – in some respects, I guess I am a bargain hunter.

But lately, those flyers have not been very exciting.  There is only so many things you can get excited about at a grocery store and trust me my excitement is waning.  So, when I went to the mailbox today, I was just hoping for something – or anything that would make getting the flyers worthwhile.

At the mailbox, I was greeted with more grocery flyers.  Great, I thought, so much for anything good in there.  But digging deeper, I found something that made my day – a flyer for Home Inspection Tampa.

Why would I be excited about home inspection?  Well, as it turns out, a good friend of mine is in the market for a new home, but has had problems finding a home inspection company that actually had time to do a home inspection – and this might be the answer to her prayers.