Have you ever watched late night TV when you get a case of insomnia? I would get insomnia quite a bit and be up to 3 or 4 in the morning. TV at that time usually consists of commercial programs.. you know… the kind of programs that try to sell half-asleep people all kinds of things. They sell household cleaners, exercise equipment, colon cleanse products, beauty products and much more.

If you’re a shop-a-holic.. don’t stay up late at night and watch TV.. you’ll go broke. Those people selling that stuff are good at what they do and they can really rope you in if you aren’t careful. It’s best to find a movie or some DIY show to watch.. it’s cheaper.

* 1/2 pint of oil
* 1 chicken, cut to 8 pieces
* 2 bowls of rice (1lb. 5 oz. approximately)
* 5 bowls of meat broth
* 1 green pepper
* 1 red pepper
* 1 small can of peas
* 1 small onion
* 2 tomatoes
* Saffron
* 1 clove of garlic (optional)
* Parsley
* Salt

Start by heating half of the oil and once warm add the cut chicken and let it cook for 15 min. Once it’s brown, set it aside in a dish. Add the chopped onion. After 5 minutes, add diced tomatoes, without seeds and peeled.

Let it cook about 5 minutes more, mashing the tomatoes. Strain it and put it in the paella pan.

Add the rest of the oil to the paella pan. Add the green pepper, cut into half inch pieces. Add the fried chicken. Keep stirring without letting it get brown. Add salt, and the hot meat broth.

Meanwhile, chop up the garlic (optional), the parsley and the saffron, with a little bit of salt, and add a couple of soup spoonfuls of warm water. Put this mixture on the rice and stir.

When the broth has reduced to add red pepper cut to ribbons, and the peas.

Cook about 20 minutes.

Once the rice is cooked and the broth has reduced, remove the paella pan from the heat, and put it on a wet cloth for about 5 minutes.

Serve it with some lemon wedges for decoration.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words… that is if you have your camera with you.. and your batteries are charged or fresh… and your compact flash card is empty. If your batteries are dead then that picture is worth nothing.

I always download photos from my camera as soon as possible after taking pictures. When we went to Texas I downloaded every night when we stopped for the night. After we got home I transferred the pictures from the laptop to my desktop and then saved them to disk so I’ll always have them. It’s about time to do a photo backup again as I’ve added a lot more pictures to my desktop. It would be so sad if something happened to the desktop and those memories were lost.

I had 3 of my grandkids here overnight on Saturday. For dinner I made cheeseburgers and fries for dinner. The youngest one, Kody, saw a small jar on the counter that came out of the box of NASCAR burgers and asked what it was. It was a jar of seasoning and Kody said he didn’t want that on his burger. I told him ok and he left the kitchen. I proceeded to put the seasoning on all of the burgers. As they were eating and Kody was almost done with his burger I asked him how it was. He told me it was yummy. I then told him that it had the seasoning on it that he said he didn’t want. The look on his face was priceless. He did finish the cheeseburger… with a smile.

We all ate so much that night that all of us should have hopped on a treadmill to work it all off! We all had a great time and I was so happy to see them. I’ve really missed those little buggers.

Did you know that some companies keep strict tabs on their vehicles? Vehicles such as delivery trucks, taxi cabs and armored trucks sometimes have gps tracking devices in them which allows the vehicle owners to make sure deliveries are being made on time and cabs are where they are supposed to be.

They’re also sometimes used on wildlife to allow scientists to study its activities and migration patterns. Some cars are equipped with it too which allows the authorities to find the vehicle if stolen. GPS has many good uses.

Here are some things you should do before you leave for vacation.

1. get a trusted friend or family member to keep an eye on your house
2. if you have pets either take them with you or have them boarded at a friend, family member’s house or a kennel.
3. stop your newspaper delivery.
4. put a hold on mail delivery.
5. make sure your ademco alarm system is in good working order.
6. make sure all your doors and windows are locked when you leave.
7. put your lights on timers so it looks like someone is home.

If you do these things you should have one less thing to worry about while you’re away.

It’s always nice to have a romantic dinner for 2. Pack up the kids and ship them to a relative or babysitter for an overnight stay. Prepare hubby’s favorite meal, turn the lights down low, light candles, pretty yourself up, put on your hot lingerie, pour some wine and watch the excitement happen. Hubby’s eyes will light up and it will give him something to remember for a long time.

Put some spark in your marriage. Every relationship needs something like this once in awhile.

When I got my new living room furniture I had to do some creative rearranging. See.. my elliptical was in the living room and after getting my furniture there was no room for that anymore. I folded up the elliptical and rolled it into the second bedroom where I had to do some more rearranging. It’s now in front of the window and there is still plenty of room to move around both sides of the bed. I’d love to have a separate room to keep my exercise/strength equipment in. Maybe one of these days when we get a house we’ll be able to do that.