Diary

Most of you have read the scare-mail about the person whose kidneys were stolen while he was passed out. Well, read on. While the kidney story was an urban legend, this one is not. It's happening every day.

    My thighs were stolen from me during the night a few years ago. It was just that quick.  I went to sleep in my body and woke up with someone else's thighs.  The new ones had the texture of cooked oatmeal.  Who would have done such a cruel thing to legs that had been mine for years? Whose thighs were these and what happened to mine?  I spent the entire summer looking for my thighs. Finally, hurt and angry, I resigned myself to living out my life in jeans and Sheer Energy pantyhose. Then, just when my guard was down, the thieves struck  again.

    My rear end was next.  I knew it was the same gang, because they took pains to match my new rear end to the thighs they stuck me with earlier.  I couldn't believe that my new rear end was attached at least three inches lower than my original. Now, my rear complemented my legs, lump for lump.  Frantic, I prayed  that long skirts would stay in fashion.

    It was two years ago when I realized my arms had been switched.  One morning I was fixing my hair and I watched horrified but  fascinated as the flesh of my upper arms swung to and fro with the motion of the hairbrush.  This was really getting scary. My body was being replaced one section at a time. How clever and fiendish!

    Age? Age has nothing to do with it. Age is supposed to creep up, unnoticed, something like maturity. NO, I was being attacked repeatedly and without warning.   In despair, I gave up my T-shirts.  What could they do to me next?

    My poor neck suddenly disappeared faster than the Thanksgiving turkey it now resembled. That's why I decided to tell my story.  I can't take on the medical profession by myself.  Women of the world, wake up and smell the coffee! That really isn't plastic that those surgeons are using!

    You KNOW where they are getting those replacement parts, don't you?  The next time you suspect someone has had a face "lifted", look again.  Was it lifted from you?  I think I finally found my thighs - and I hope that Cindy Crawford paid a really good price for them!

This is not a hoax. This is happening to women in every town every night. WARN YOUR FRIENDS!

P.S. I must say that last year I thought someone had stolen my breasts. I was lying in bed and they were gone! As I jumped out of bed, I was relieved to see that they had just been hiding in my armpits as I slept. Now I keep them hidden in my waistband.

It's been awhile since I've had a good rant. I always try to dwell on the more pleasant things in life. But there comes a time when I either have to let off some steam or get therapy. Letting off steam is cheaper. So be warned. I feel a rant coming on!

Let's talk about Microsoft. You know, generally speaking, Microsoft is arrogant and very difficult to deal with. If you don't have any problems with one of their products, you probably don't know this and don't really care. But when you have a problem - especially if it is a problem that results from one of their IMPROVEMENTS - those updates they so frequently require to patch one of their "oopsies" - then you find out just how arrogant and difficult they can be.

I suppose you are wondering if I have an example in mind. So kind of you to ask! Because I do, in fact, have an example that I would like to share...before I explode!

You see, I use Outlook 2003 to receive all of my e-mail from my various e-mail accounts. This normally works like a charm. I love it because I don't have to log on to the different accounts to check all my e-mail. Everything is fed into Outlook via Outlook Connector.

A couple of days ago, Microsoft released one (or maybe more than one) of their critical updates. Immediately after installation I noticed Outlook Connector had stopped working. Oh, it "says" it signs in to my e-mail accounts. It tells me this over and over again, in fact. But it LIES! It's not really logging in and it's not downloading my e-mail into Outlook. So now, to get my e-mail, I have to log on to each of my different accounts. To say I am irritated about this is a gross understatement.

Did I mention that the accounts I'm having the most problems with are MSN accounts. You know, MSN, as in Microsoft. If anybody should be able to work together seamlessly, Microsoft should certainly work with other Microsoft products...without flaw.

But the worst part, to add insult to injury, when I tried to report the problem, I found that e-mail support - simple E-MAIL SUPPORT - would cost me $35.00. Yes, BELIEVE IT OR NOT, they are going to CHARGE ME $35.00 just to send an e-mail to Microsoft to tell them that one of their updates has evidently screwed up an important feature in one of their products.

I have been a Microsoft fan because I felt they provided reasonably good software. But if they are going to charge users to report problems - problems they obviously have caused with their updates - then I will no longer remain an advocate. The only thing that changed on my computer was their recent update. Outlook connector was working perfectly before the update. Now it doesn't work. Duh!

Microsoft, get your head out of the sand and allow users to report problems without charging them to tell you that you have screwed up. If you don't, though it may take time, you will continue to lose market share because people aren't going to put up with this kind of arrogance. Not forever. One experience is enough to lose a customer. You directly lose customers one at a time, but those customers tell other customers who listen. And they tell others. Sometimes, if they are like me, they tell as many people as they can and some of them are going to listen. So one dissatisfied customer can cost you a handful more. Do the math. You may be the king of the world right now, but kings can be dethroned. If you don't pay attention to your customers and get over yourself, your time to be dethroned is coming.

I've been missing my little Schnauzer, Maddie, who died in March. I don't know why she's been on my mind so much...maybe because she left such a hole in my heart. The house seems kind of empty without her. So I wanted to share a picture with you of her grave and the beautiful flower that continues to bloom there.

The flowers are still blooming, but fall has come to Oklahoma. The temperatures are starting to drop into the 50's at night.

The grass is still green, but not quite as green as it was less than 10 days ago. And the leaves are now starting to change colors. Just starting...barely beginning to change. But it's obvious that fall has arrived. It's dark so much more of the time. I hate that most of all. And while fall can be a very nice season, it's too short. Winter follows too quickly behind.

I've refused to turn on the heat. I'm still firmly in denial that we are headed into the cold, dark, dreary time of the year. I'm NOT a winter person. I intensely dislike having to risk life and limb on icy roads to go to work. And employers seem to think that is what you should do if you want to keep your job. In some ways, life is much easier than it used to be. But in others, it is much harder.

Anyway, happy fall to you. Enjoy the flowers while you can! I have a feeling they won't be blooming much longer...

It's been raining quite a bit lately, which is normal for fall. But I have a question that has been bugging me and I'm hoping SOMEONE can give me a logical explanation for the weird behavior when it is raining of people who have paper routes (the kind where they have a big territory, so they have to drive).

You see, if the sun is shining or it's cloudy and gloomy, my paper is where I expect it to be: in the driveway. Easy to find; easy to retrieve. But when it is raining (or snowing, for that matter), the paper is always thrown in the middle of my yard. This means I have to cross half my yard...my wet squishy yard...to retrieve my paper. I can't wear slippers...they would get totally sopping wet. But my shoes still get soaked. And they get wet grass all over them so I have to do a major cleaning before I can go back inside the house.

So my question is this: are people who have these paper routes sadistic? Do they think it is funny to imagine all the people who have to get their feet wet running across their yards to get their paper? It takes more time to get the paper from the yard too. So do they enjoy making people spend more time in the rain? Or do they, for some totally strange reason, think they are doing us a favor by throwing the paper in the middle of the yard instead of in the driveway?

You've heard that old saying: Red sky in the morning, sailors take warning; red sky at night, sailors delight. Well, here's the sky I woke up to this morning...

I suddenly feel a little apprehensive!!! There's no truth to that old saying, right??