I'm going to post another post about reading, later. The actual act of reading, I mean, not about books. Well, it will be about books, too, since that's what we're reading. That post was going to be this post, then I got into a riff and onto the music and let's just say it outgrew the purpose for which I am writing this post.
Yes, writing about reading. This post is about the books you are reading right now.
Right now I am reading: *note that I usually do have more than one book going at a time!
"Scorpion Betrayal" by Andrew Kaplan. It's a spy novel that Big Daddy picked up on his travels. It's fairly compelling, and if you, like Big Daddy, like a good spy/ murder/ terror plot mystery, then I can recommend it.
"The Right to Write" by Julia Cameron. It's a lovely guide on how to write more and better by bringing more writing into your life. My good friend, cheerleader and proofreader, Lisa, sent it to me along with one of Julia's other books. They're fabulous!
A good read that I recommend is:
"Pride and Prejudice" by Jane Austen - Fitzwilliam Darcy is THE MAN! As is Collin Firth. They are one.
"The Help" by Kathrine Stockwell - amazing
"Hunger Games" by Emily Siefe - If you haven't read it, you should.
"East of Eden" by Ernest Hemingway - Holy Moly - I read it twice, loaned it to a friend who read it twice, then I read it again.
Best
M
Showing posts with label The Stuff. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Stuff. Show all posts
May 4, 2012
Apr 27, 2012
Product Review - Oxyclean - It's the Stuff!
You know all those crazy commercials for stuff you've never seen in stores? "But wait! There's more!". Yeah, those commercials. The ones that made the late Billy Mays famous. They spawned "As Seen on TV" stores in shopping malls in the '90's, which morphed into large sections of Walgreen's and Walmart (or Wally Whirled as we call it) Stores today. Some of that stuff is great! Just ask my sister about her Pajama Jean addiction.
The first of these adds that I paid attention to were for Oxyclean. It was Pre MiniMe and the ads for this magic powder seemed to air non-stop and always at a much louder volume than the program we were actually watching. I mean, do you remember how the blood, grass stains, mustard and dirt just disappeared from the shirts and jeans? What about the red wine stains on the carpet? Not to mention how "Grandma's" yellowed old lace curtains turned white again? Could this stuff really work?
A couple of years after Oxyclean became a part of our evening viewing fodder, Big Daddy and I renovated our Master Bathroom. Renovated is a relative term, as what really happened is that I woke up in the middle of the night to find that the dining room ceiling (located directly below the Master Bath) was on the dining room floor, and water was pouring out of the gaping hole.
As part of the renovation, we had the lower part of the bathroom walls and the shower area tiled in beautiful, hand glazed, Portuguese tile. I know. We didn't know any better. I'm not sure we were even 30 at the time. The tile performed well. It looked nice, but it didn't look the kind of nice that makes the bather think: "Wow, that white tile is BEAUTIFUL! Extravagant! So luxurious!". It was more the kind of nice that looked like "I wonder where they bought the tile?.". feh!
A couple of years later, Big Daddy was complaining about the grout being stained. He went on and on about the staining of the grout. Then he started complaining that I might not be cleaning the tile correctly.
"Really?", I"m thinking. "Are ya sure you want to go there, Bucko? Cuz I got some Clorox spray anna toothbrush with your name on it. That it's actually your toothbrush is something else all together!", but I digress....
So, one day, I'm at the grocery store, looking for some magical cleaning agent that will get the grout and tile the way Big Daddy thinks they should look, and I spy this blue canister on the shelf. Yes, you know it! It was a canister of Oxyclean! And it was cheap!
I bought that powder, I took it home, I set it on the counter for Big Daddy to see when he got home. You know what his reaction was?! He picked it up, read the canister, said "huh". Put it down, and while walking away says "Hope it works out.".
Really. Big Daddy. He lives dangerously. On the edge, you might say. Some day I'll tell you the OTHER part of our "Going Home" story. The one where he left for his new job 2 weeks before the movers came. Sorry, I know. "Focus"!
So the Oxyclean went beneath the kitchen sink.
Meanwhile - you're going to love this - the next time I cleaned the shower tile... I really looked at it. It just didn't seem like a stain. We didn't have a mold issue. It looked more... red... beneath the glaze of the tile. So, I go down to the garage, where we put the extra 3 boxes of the stuff because we were so afraid we wouldn't have enough. Actually the contractor was more concerned that we wouldn't have enough.... hmmm... Anyway, I open the box and I realize that our gorgeous, hand glazed Portuguese tile was a white glaze, over... are ya ready? Hand over your mouth?
TERRACOTTA!!! It wasn't a red stain or an algae or a mold IT WAS CLAY!!! There was no actual stain in the very clean. Ok, occasionally clean, shower. sigh.
The Gruve was feeling a mite out of sorts after that, so she indulged in a bit of chocolate. Which got on her shirt, which GruvEmom then threw in the wash, and then dried. And now she had a D-A-M-N-E-D chocolate stain on her white shirt! Ooohhhh!!! Somehow this was all Big Daddy's fault!
Then, a little bell went off... Oxyclean... could it be as good as it says? Is it really the magic laundry elixir that Billy Mays promised it would be? I decided to check it out. I read the directions on the canister. I opened the canister. I gave the white and blue powder the side eye. I read the directions again. I heated up a couple of cups of water in the microwave. I added the prescribed amount of Oxyclean to the hot water. I mixed it. Then I poured it on the stain, right there on the counter top. I gave it the side eye then I walked away.
Ten minutes later, as I breezed through the kitchen to get a Diet Coke from the fridge, I passed by my little experiment and couldn't resist a look at the progress. Well my, my, MY! The stain was GONE! It works!
Since then, there is a little bit of Oxyclean in every load of laundry and a "Club Size" canister of the stuff lives on top of my dryer with the lingerie bags and the Tide. I have a clean bucket that I soak the biggest, baddest of stains in - somtimes for days. I almost never need, use or buy bleach anymore so no crazy bleach stains on any of my laundry and I understand that's a good thing, as I now have a septic system.
Now Oxyclean doesn't know about me, and I don't work for them, but it puts the Groove in this GruvEmom's laundry day, so I just wanted to tell ya all about it! Try it! You'll love it!
The first of these adds that I paid attention to were for Oxyclean. It was Pre MiniMe and the ads for this magic powder seemed to air non-stop and always at a much louder volume than the program we were actually watching. I mean, do you remember how the blood, grass stains, mustard and dirt just disappeared from the shirts and jeans? What about the red wine stains on the carpet? Not to mention how "Grandma's" yellowed old lace curtains turned white again? Could this stuff really work?
A couple of years after Oxyclean became a part of our evening viewing fodder, Big Daddy and I renovated our Master Bathroom. Renovated is a relative term, as what really happened is that I woke up in the middle of the night to find that the dining room ceiling (located directly below the Master Bath) was on the dining room floor, and water was pouring out of the gaping hole.
As part of the renovation, we had the lower part of the bathroom walls and the shower area tiled in beautiful, hand glazed, Portuguese tile. I know. We didn't know any better. I'm not sure we were even 30 at the time. The tile performed well. It looked nice, but it didn't look the kind of nice that makes the bather think: "Wow, that white tile is BEAUTIFUL! Extravagant! So luxurious!". It was more the kind of nice that looked like "I wonder where they bought the tile?.". feh!
A couple of years later, Big Daddy was complaining about the grout being stained. He went on and on about the staining of the grout. Then he started complaining that I might not be cleaning the tile correctly.
"Really?", I"m thinking. "Are ya sure you want to go there, Bucko? Cuz I got some Clorox spray anna toothbrush with your name on it. That it's actually your toothbrush is something else all together!", but I digress....
So, one day, I'm at the grocery store, looking for some magical cleaning agent that will get the grout and tile the way Big Daddy thinks they should look, and I spy this blue canister on the shelf. Yes, you know it! It was a canister of Oxyclean! And it was cheap!
I bought that powder, I took it home, I set it on the counter for Big Daddy to see when he got home. You know what his reaction was?! He picked it up, read the canister, said "huh". Put it down, and while walking away says "Hope it works out.".
Really. Big Daddy. He lives dangerously. On the edge, you might say. Some day I'll tell you the OTHER part of our "Going Home" story. The one where he left for his new job 2 weeks before the movers came. Sorry, I know. "Focus"!
So the Oxyclean went beneath the kitchen sink.
Meanwhile - you're going to love this - the next time I cleaned the shower tile... I really looked at it. It just didn't seem like a stain. We didn't have a mold issue. It looked more... red... beneath the glaze of the tile. So, I go down to the garage, where we put the extra 3 boxes of the stuff because we were so afraid we wouldn't have enough. Actually the contractor was more concerned that we wouldn't have enough.... hmmm... Anyway, I open the box and I realize that our gorgeous, hand glazed Portuguese tile was a white glaze, over... are ya ready? Hand over your mouth?
TERRACOTTA!!! It wasn't a red stain or an algae or a mold IT WAS CLAY!!! There was no actual stain in the very clean. Ok, occasionally clean, shower. sigh.
The Gruve was feeling a mite out of sorts after that, so she indulged in a bit of chocolate. Which got on her shirt, which GruvEmom then threw in the wash, and then dried. And now she had a D-A-M-N-E-D chocolate stain on her white shirt! Ooohhhh!!! Somehow this was all Big Daddy's fault!
Then, a little bell went off... Oxyclean... could it be as good as it says? Is it really the magic laundry elixir that Billy Mays promised it would be? I decided to check it out. I read the directions on the canister. I opened the canister. I gave the white and blue powder the side eye. I read the directions again. I heated up a couple of cups of water in the microwave. I added the prescribed amount of Oxyclean to the hot water. I mixed it. Then I poured it on the stain, right there on the counter top. I gave it the side eye then I walked away.
Ten minutes later, as I breezed through the kitchen to get a Diet Coke from the fridge, I passed by my little experiment and couldn't resist a look at the progress. Well my, my, MY! The stain was GONE! It works!
Since then, there is a little bit of Oxyclean in every load of laundry and a "Club Size" canister of the stuff lives on top of my dryer with the lingerie bags and the Tide. I have a clean bucket that I soak the biggest, baddest of stains in - somtimes for days. I almost never need, use or buy bleach anymore so no crazy bleach stains on any of my laundry and I understand that's a good thing, as I now have a septic system.
Now Oxyclean doesn't know about me, and I don't work for them, but it puts the Groove in this GruvEmom's laundry day, so I just wanted to tell ya all about it! Try it! You'll love it!
Mar 31, 2012
Just so Ya know
I just want to let you know that Big Daddy, MiniMe and I have returned from a no holds barred shopping trip to my favorite ever store - Job Lot - I just love Job Lot! If you spend $200 at the Job Lot, you better have a truck to take you home cuz sister (or brother), you cleaned that place out!
I even - hold yourselves, bargain afficianados - am on their e-mailing list of coupons, what's on special and "coming attractions". They take manufacturer's coupons on top of that! Be still my parsimonious heart!
I got Peony rings for $2 ea, grass seed (URI #2) $5, laundry detergent $3.50, I could go on but I don't want you all to storm the place!
I discovered Job Lot when I was a college student. Christmas shopping was a dream! Tools for Dad, Books for Mom, make up for younger sister, reading glasses for the Grandparents.
I was just so excited by my bargains I just had to share. I hope you have a Job Lot near you!
Gruve
I even - hold yourselves, bargain afficianados - am on their e-mailing list of coupons, what's on special and "coming attractions". They take manufacturer's coupons on top of that! Be still my parsimonious heart!
I got Peony rings for $2 ea, grass seed (URI #2) $5, laundry detergent $3.50, I could go on but I don't want you all to storm the place!
I discovered Job Lot when I was a college student. Christmas shopping was a dream! Tools for Dad, Books for Mom, make up for younger sister, reading glasses for the Grandparents.
I was just so excited by my bargains I just had to share. I hope you have a Job Lot near you!
Gruve
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