My 8 Best Oldies Songs

“Oldies” has become a pretty broad phrase. It used to refer to the beginning of old-school rock n’ roll, meaning early 1950’s to early 60’s, but it’s gradually come to include anything from the 1950’s all the way through to the late 80’s and early 90’s. I still like to think of “oldies” as only including music from the 1950’s-70’s, and really enjoy my online oldies radio station. So here’s my list of favorite oldies- by the older definition of being music from the 1950’s-70’s.

Fly Me To The Moon- Frank Sinatra

Fill my heart with songs

Let me sing forever more

You are all I long for

All I worship and adore

....in other words, I love you!

Can’t Help Falling In Love-Elvis Presley

Take my hand

Take my whole life too

For I can’t help

Falling in love with you

Time In a Bottle- Jim Croce

If I had a box for wishes and dreams that had never come true

That box would be empty except for the memory

Of how they were answered by you.

Sugar Pie Honey Bunch- The Four Tops

Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch

      You know that I love you(I dooo)

                I can't help myself...

       No... I can't help myself

Lollipop- Chordettes

I call him

Lollipop lollipop

Oh lolli lolli lolli

Lollipop lollipop....

Mack The Knife- Bobby Darin

Now … Jenny Diver … ho, ho … yeah … Sukey Tawdry      

     Ooh … Miss Lotte Lenya and old Lucy Brown

     Oh, the line forms on the right, babe

     Now that Macky’s back in town.

Folsom Prison Blues-Johnny Cash

When I was just a baby my mama told me. Son,

Always be a good boy, don't ever play with guns.

But I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die

When I hear that whistle blowing, I hang my head and cry..

My Maria- B.W. Stevenson

Gypsy lady

You’re a miracle worker for me

You set my soul free

Like a ship sailin' on the sea

One of these days when I have some cash lying around I’ll start buying up old albums. I know just the place to do it, too. ioldiesmusicstore.com has more, and the best oldies songs available. For now, though, I’ll turn up the radio and dance around my living room to some Sinatra and Cash.

Car Insurance

Insurance seems to be a topic that I'm asked to write about on a fairly regular basis. I'm not completely sure why that is, but I've found that insurance quote sites, especially auto insurance quote tools, are my friends. Sites like http://www.carinsurancerates.me/ that allow you to get rates compared by simply giving some basic information can cause you to have a few more phone calls and emails than you really want, but it's worthwhile to be saved from the hours of leg work that would have to be done to get the same information on your own.

And you know, auto insurance is one of those things where companies can ask you to pay insane amounts simply because you're too old or too young, have too many marks on your driving record, drive a two door or four door car, have bad vision, your car is old, and etc. If there is something they can hold against you, it's most likely they will. So shopping for a company that will give you a good rate in spite of these things can be vital to the well being of your household budget.

I am so glad I have my little person to keep me company when Quinn can't be at home.

I feel so lonely if Quinn is gone more than his regular 46 hours a week. Other than that time we typically spend every moment together. The only regular exceptions are an occasion run to the grocery store or chiropractor while one of us keeps Gavin at home. So when days like yesterday come along, where he was supposed to be off work- but went in for 4 hours of overtime first thing in the morning, then left at 4:30pm to help Rann finish out their bathroom and didn't get home 'til almost 10pm- I can't help just aching with gratitude that my GavinMeister is here to keep me from feeling all lonely.

This morning he woke up happy. Snuggled close to me to nurse and smiled up at me with sleepy eyes.

When he was more awake he spent 20 minutes standing at the piano hitting the few keys he could reach and singing with all his heart. It made me so glad.
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House Hunt Update:

So we're back to the Battlefield house. The owners agreed to several thousand dollars worth of reconstruction work and we're set to close by July 15th. We're pretty excited. I can't wait to have that huge, beautiful yard to spend my afternoons with Gavin in. I'm planning on picking up packing supplies after we turn in our 30 day notice on July 1st. I am dreading packing, but looking forward to unpacking....

In the meantime, does anybody know if you can paint old, dark stone?

xoxoxoxoxox

Starting to plan Gavin's birthday party. I've got a guest list, a cake idea and a list of gifts I'm hoping to get for him. I know we're still almost 2 months out, but what with moving and unpacking being the majority of what I'll be accomplishing until the first week of August, I figure I had better have a plan before then. I haven't really thought about decorations yet...not sure whether or not I'm even going to try to decorate. We'll see.

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My back is sunburnt from taking a long walk in the evening in a sundress yesterday. It itches. A lot.

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I've been working for the last 20 minutes, but I just got a "No Tasks Available" message and had to log out. This is becoming the Friday norm, and is VERY frustrating. I was planning on doubling my work on Fridays through the summer to make up for the lack of orchestra, but so far that has been a bust. Darn.

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House pics!

Front- I want to paint the dark rock more of a carthage stone color and trim the windows/shutters with blue.

Back Yard. Enough room for volleyball or a pool...

Floors are Vinyl Laminate-We want to replace them with hardwood sometime. Also going to change the color of the fireplace and eventually install a gas log. 

Kitchen is VERY small, but cute. No dishwasher... yet... 

More back yard. Don't know whether or not the swingset is staying put.

Back of the house.

Stupid Advertisements

Have to apologize for all the spam posts lately- I haven't had time to blog for real, but I've been getting a lot of paid assignments, so I'm sure my blog looks like junk mail. :P

Anywho, exhausted and going to bed, just had to say sorry!

My Site

Guest post written by my buddy Aldo Mays

It wasn't until I started designing my own business website that realized how much more went into getting a web presence than just colors and www.domainnames.com. There were so many things on the backside that I had never even heard of, it seemed only prudent to enlist the help of a professional graphic designer. Wallace has been an absolute blessing and he sure knows his way around the computer! All I had to do was tell him what I wanted the site to look like and he was off… Putting up themes and photo albums like there was no tomorrow.

It didn't take long at all for my site to start looking the way I had always imagined. Wallace was worth every single penny he charged and I would hire him again in a heartbeat to help with other projects. The advice I have to give other small business owners is not to cheap out when it comes to hiring a graphic designer. You won't regret spending the extra cash on this crucial part of your business.

Credit Scores

I would have thought, going into a house hunt and applying for a loan, that credit scores would have a huge impact on the interest rate we received. Turns out that home loans come at whatever interest rate is current, and if you get approved you are approved, whether your credit was perfect or you just barely snuck under the wire. That was something of a relief to me, since miscommunications with the hospital and some payment confusion while Quinn was in Africa 3 years ago have our credit on the less than perfect (but still good) end of things.

Between my evaluation job and some of the payed blogging I do I find a shocking amount of interesting and useful websites. One site I found today seemed pretty interesting. http://www.fivestarhomemortgages.com/ is a site that not only has a ton of useful information about credit scores and home loans, but has a tool that allows you to enter some information and be contacted with interest rates for home loans in your area.

NOT Car Shopping

I love our car, so there's really no reason for me to be browsing car dealership sites, but I do anyway. It's a little bit pathetic, but I like looking at new designs and using "customize your own" tools to create ridiculously expensive creations.  One site I ran into today was this Hyundai Genesis Dealer.  They actually are just a Hyundai dealer, but their website is called "One Genesis Dealer," so I think they think they specialize  in Genesis.

At first I was looking at the site to try and find some good hyundai genesis interior or customization pictures, but when I went to look I found more history on the company that anything. Seems that they're a family owned company that's been growing and building since the 30's. I always think it's pretty cool to see family businesses that are a real success, so I thought that was kinda neat.

Anywho, just thought it was an interesting link, Back to life!

Stupid Google.

Our computer has picked up some sort of trojan that has completely hijacked all of our google functions. Quinn, so far, has not been able to weed it out, so we've been stuck using Bing for all of our search engine issues (I HATE Bing) and my blogger hasn't been functioning, so the word pad blog posts that I've written over the last month haven't made it past the deskop, and I'm stuck writing on the dying laptop.

Oh well.

Whatever.
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So, we're house hunting. Several weeks ago I mentioned to Quinn that we had all of 12 weeks to be moved out of this place. A few days of looking at the rental market and we realized that there was no way that we were going to find a place that met our needs that fit our monthly budget, so we started looking into purchasing options. At the current interest rate it is significantly cheaper to make a house payment then to pay rent, so we're trying to buy.

We spent a week writing down lists of addresses and driving all over the city to peek and windows and scope out neighborhoods. We sent our list to my brother, Aaron's real estate agent, and on her first day back in town we met at 9am and started the hunt. After crossing three of our potential favorites off of the list (flooded basement, termites and...more termites) we landed at an adorable little place in a great location for an absolute steal. Headed back to the office to put an offer in, got there, and it had sold that morning.

So that afternoon we went to look at three more. And the next morning we had 9 additional houses to look at. At this point we were close to one we had looked at the morning before, and both of us had kept going back to in conversation, so we went to view that one a second time. By then we had looked at enough places that our eyes had learned to look past dirt, horrific colors on the walls and old fixtures and we realized that that place had the potential to very easily become what we were looking for.

So we put in an offer there.

Come to find out, after our offer was accepted, the house is in the middle of a sink hole area on a flood plain. Wow. SO, we requested to be released from that offer and tonight we went hunting AGAIN.

And maybe, just maybe, we found home. We'll see. As soon as the paper work is all sorted out from the flood plain sink hole, our offer on this one will be official. It needs no work other than a cleaning to be ready to move into. It's a bit smaller than the places we've been looking at, but meets all of our needs. It's a good price, good location, and a beautiful home. We're hoping...

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And while we hope- Gavin now has his top front teeth, is learning how to stand without support and talks CONSTANTLY. Not real words, of course, but he jabbers from the second he wakes up until he murmurs himself to sleep. It's lovely.

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For tonight, over and out.
-Joanna

Insure Me For Life?

I've been asked to post about life insurance quotes, so I'm going to just going to ramble a bit and give you a link for free quotes, if that works for all of you.

Life insurance, it seems, dates back to ancient Rome, where citizens joined "burial clubs" to which they paid dues, and who, in return, covered the costs of burials and helped surviving relatives monetarily.  

 To be perfectly honest, I like "policy holder" better than "burial club member", if I must carry one label or the other. Being part of a burial club seems somewhat macabre. But on the other hand, I could start a business called the Burial Club for goths and necrophiliacs and make a fortune. It would still just be life insurance, but said in a more realistic way. Heck, I might be able to get on board with the whole idea afterall.