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After I refreshed my browser I could see the responses. I left you a few messages there, can you check them for me?

Yes; I responded on how to find & update your preferences. You'll get used to it, it only takes a little time. If you have ongoing problems, I'll give you a couple of e-mails to contact their management team for help.

MP ... so glad to see you OK & posting here! Red Letter Day .. got Bobbi over to AARP this morning. Now we're talking about "issuing awards" .. come visit when you have a chance!

Hello all. Welcome BD.. you little cutie! Glad you are okay MP. I read the Marie post and you all did an excellent job telling her like it is!

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

OH! MP, so good to hear from you! Glad you're ok albeit frustrated. Stay in touch!!!

I'm here mama! :)
at work today and I think I have a date with boo tonight directly after work!
so who's bday did I miss......judyg???

Thanks for the welcome guys. What a great bunch you all are. @MP although I am new here, I can tell if you don't stay in touch, the ladies are calling out the hounds :-) (nice to be cared for)

this little group is pretty special BD! :)

hahahaha! i just posted on some other thread...but was talking to you guys! oops!

Thta's all right, as long as you didn't tell any secrets!!!

I not! lol
I said I just heard a funny line....."This tastes just like what my mom used to try and make."

Can you imagine? I hope I deleted it fast enough. They are going to say, "what the hay?"

so roo, you will be a single lady for a couple months I think I read??? how nice! :) you can be extremely selfish! and chill to your hearts desire!

NO, NO, NO, the plot thickens!!! Emailed LAdd and she knows nothing about it unless he is planning on surprising her. Says BH keeps calling her every 2 or 3 weeks to say he is going but then other things happen. Boy, am I milking this now!!! I am such a b***h!!!

Ez - my brain and tongue are too out of sync to cope with that!!! More old age???? Actually if I do with with an American accent it works. Not compatible with Aussie.

This lady just posted her dream kitchen - check it out, it looks amazing

http://www.dejongdreamhouse.com/2012/04/introducingour-dream-kitchen.html

Sadly, my cooking doesn't deserve anything like that.

Happy Birthday to the 4 March people!! Judyg, STK, Antoinette, and Busylady and anyone else I've forgotten!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ok roo, my favorite thing in the kitchen as far as a great idea is using the tension bars for the spices in the drawer! Brilliant!
My only beef is why did they have all those cabinets custom made and not make the cab cover the fridge...
Very Nice Kitchen though!

Roo, did I miss a comment? What's the conspiracy?

no ez...I was talking about the sides of the fridge sticking out beyond the cabinet that it stands in...it looked like it jutted out quite a bit beyond the cabinet. Dont get me wrong, my sticks out too, but I dont think that far...and i just had to use the cabs i had. I even thought about adding a little more onto my one wall, so you cant see the frig from the side at all. Prob won't though. It's not too bad looking. I have bigger things to conquer right now. :)

MP, Michael Buble is one of my favorites! Got to see him a couple years ago when he came to the Sprint Center. He is very smooth and quite funny. What's neat is I've groomed my daughter to appreciate Jazz as well. She went with me and now purchases his CD's for her personal collection. Makes me smile!

Roo, love that kitchen. Saw it when she posted one other time. Beautiful.

MP, why do you think there's something wrong with your cabs? I like them!

they're okay....just would have loved something more stream-lined and square for the look i was wanting, but it was NOT in the budget. I'll get new cabs in the next house! ha! the olld houzz has new cabs I believe. oh yea

my aunt and uncle did something cool in the house they built a couple of years ago. they had cabs built and covered in formica type material. gray laminate...very nice and easy to clean. their house is pretty cool. This is right before they were about finished..

In the second pic where you see the top of the ladder...there's a door. that is where there is a catwalk going across now. I took these pics right before that was about to be built. One of the last building/construction things left to do. This house is not huge, but nice. It has a full basement though which is an awesome work space. My aunt is very anal and it is a perfect place for hiding any messy work projects. Her husband is the opposite. He likes clutter! lol I love him. :) They are a hoot together. I think they drink a lot of wine and beer! HA!

outside pics....

Bobbi, your brain is definitely too full. The conspiracy was BH going to LA and I'm the last to find out. Now I find out from LAdd, she isn't expecting him at all and knows nothing.

Hi Everyone, Happy Getting up Way too Early Tomorrow!!!!!!!!. It makes me tired just thinking about it :o(

lol Mary..I'm sleeping in!

I may not sleep...but I'm staying in! G'night all!

Sweet Dreams then Darzy and Dave! Someone should have them.

Liked a lot of that kitchen, but I was curious about cork flooring; might feel good underfoot .. but is it sealed to prevent absorbtion & stains? That was one VERY large kitchen .. and pantry to handle, whether the homeowner has a brain injury or not. On one hand I liked the organization of the tension-rod spice drawer (I think I have the same exact Thermador cooktop), but on another hand it seemed a big OCD to me. It means taking all the spices you buy in the store, and transferring them into identical bottles that are all the same size. I can only speak for myself .. sometimes I buy a different brand, and the jar is larger .. what do you do with the "excess"? I would have liked just a little color in that kitchen too.

Yes, Astraea, cork is sealed but you do have to resurface it every few years, especially in high traffic areas, a bit like timber flooring. It is much nicer to walk on, my only concern was that it does mark. There is a member here called Cancork and they give lots of great advice and information on cork and their website is very informative too. I have had a few discussion with them about it as it was really popular here about 20 years ago but then fizzed out mainly due to the fact that stiletto heels marked it and if you dropped a knife or anything sharp it could pierce it. I have been assured it is actually self healing.

As far as the spices go, I find that with anything in the kitchen if you decant the product to a storage container or jar I always seem to have stupid left over bits. I actually buy my spices in packets and transfer them to jars. Fortunately the packets aren't too big and I have been able to get good sized jars. They are a lot cheaper to buy that way too.

My guess is that here buying loose spices requires a specialty shop (or mail order), and the prices are higher than the name brands store-bought. Professional cooks will also say that spices degrade over time, and unless someone REALLY does a lot of cooking, and actually uses all those spices regularly, it's more "appearance" than practical, to have a spice drawer with 55 jars.

Are there really 55 spices???? lol. I get my herbs and spices at the supermarket in cellophane packets, they are just like a named brand but they sell them this way to keep the price down. They are less than half the price of bottled ones.

Roo, love that idea! They do that here but only with fresh herbs like rosemary, thyme, etc. I've never seen it with dried herbs, wish they would! It's a fabulous idea! Then I wouldn't have to worry if the tarragon thats been sitting up there for decades is still good or not the three times in my life I will use it. Lol

For spices, seriously check the Mexican section of your local grocery store. They tend to be more flavorful and much, much cheaper! They come in celephane bags so less waste.

Roo - I went back to the picture of the spice drawer, and countd bottles; I thought that was excessive.

you guys are funny....... :)
i'll tell you where i bought spices last time and they are awesome. that pita store/shop thingy. but bob, i'm hittin the mexican store next for sure. i haven't been in one in a long time, but we actually do have them here in hooterville.

PITA is short for pain in the a..

like pita bread ez....this shop in greenville is called the pita house i think. they have a restaurant on one side and a market on the other. I bought ground tumeric, mixed spices for chicken shawarma (awesome), curry powder, and basil. It's a middle eastern grocery store basically. The people who own it are Lebanese actually. That is the place that I got the baklava not long ago. It's a mix of different ethnic foods from what I could tell, but they specialize in middle eastern and indian cuisine it seemed. and greek. they had all kinds of oils and things too. pretty cool.

Hi, Tras - yep I can get the dried herbs as well as spices. Can't always get everything but most of them. Actually the thing I am missing lately is celery seed. I hate celery, have never liked it for some reason, but I just love the seeds in stews, casseroles and soups. With winter coming I must go further afield and see if I can find it.

mp love those Lebanese shops, I can eat Lebanese cuisine (except the lamb) any time.

Love a good gyro! We have palace here that is wonderful! They make a fabulous gyro and pita with roasted red pepper hummus. But no market, unfortunately.

But we do have a fantastic spice store called Penzey's. Great when the farmers market is open but not convenient for quick meals, too far out of the way but fabulous store! You can order online too. http://www.penzeys.com/cgi-bin/penzeys/penzeysstores.html. Right next to it is an olive oil store where they have tons of different flavored olive oils and basalmic vinegars. You can sample as many as you like, then they pour it straight into the bottles for you from the tanks...pretty fun to try out. http://www.thetastefulolive.com/

Hi Tras! I haven't had a chance to say hello in a long time.

Hi Mary/Peggy :). How have you been? Have you seen any mishaps from our "friend" lately? Last I checked we were behaving ourselves, probably had a talking to. It won't last, I try to check from time to time.

Oh, our friend is definitely not done, yet. I got an opportunity to know I am still thought about, but also, our friend has been befriending others. How are things in Kansas? Didn't you just have, or are having a terrific weather front passing through? I am sure it has already passed and this is old news. That is how out of touch with time I can be :o).

Tras, Mary Poulos - you're welcome to join our private OLLD group on AARP .. emphasis on "PRIVATE". If you're interested, I'll repost the directions.

We did have quite a bit of snow for awhile. 12 inches one week, then 12 again the following. But this last weekend was pretty warm plus rain so most of it is finally gone. Still a big lump here and there, just enough to look grimy. This morning we had a dusting again but then it's supposed to get in to the 60's by late week. I love the Midwest because you just never know what you're going to get from one day to the next but it's killer on the sinuses and allergies! What is really fun to see is when it's snowing with lightening, funnel clouds are always cool too. But I could definitely do without our summer humidity. How are things in your part of the woods? What have you been up to lately? I've been thinking about the speaking group you are in, I think I would really enjoy it. Sounds fun!

Astraea - Yes please repost that info AARP- Thanks

This is a link to the group "OLLD Friends": http://www.aarp.org/online-community/groups/index.action?slGroupKey=de25c62b-69a3-48f2-8478-0f20a2989c86

In the upper right corner of the screen, there should be a button that says, something like "Request to Join this Group". Click on that.

Unless you're already registed on the AARP website, it will then prompt you to register for the website first. Then you can finish submitting your request to join the group .. which I then have to process. If you have any problems, let me know. You do not have to be an AARP member to use their website.