Strange People Names That Are Real

Over the years I have come across many real persons names that are comical or just whimsical. I will list a few and ask my fellow bloggers to add to the list of any strange names that they have come across. They don't have to mean anything. This could be very interesting. Here we go.

Nell Green Alred
Mugumi Kato Mumpower
Dick Wigger ( I knew this guy)
Jay Walker
Richard Head (figure this one out)
Bill Board

My son Frank (Left Of The Dial) reminded me of a funny name for a business in New Jersey on Rte. 40. It is no longer there, but it was always a hoot to see it. The name was:

Chicks, Licks and Flicks Of course it featured Fried Chicken, Ice Cream and Videos.

He Never Ever Found Out

Some time back a couple of buddies and I were traveling through New England and Upper State New York. We were Antiquing the different Antique Shops looking for goodies. The three of us are dealers, but we all collect as well. These trips were always nice to get away to and we would hunt Antiques from the time the shops opened and until they closed. Just about every shop closed by 6 p.m. One of the things we enjoyed on these trips was eating dinner. If we were in a new area we would always ask the shop owners where was a good place to eat. We were never disappointed.

One of my two friends lives for food. Food means more to him then just about anything. If you were to give him a gift of fresh baked bread or pastry, he was your friend for life. All of the times we would travel together and would be having breakfast or dinner he would check your plate and make sure you didn't get served more food then he had. It happens, and he would be in a tizzy about it. When we are out with a bunch of friends for dinner he would eat what the others didn't. Everybody knew this and didn't mind giving him their leftovers.

On this trip to New York and New England he was cry babying about one of us getting more on our plate then him. We got fed (pun intended) up with him crying about the food. This one particular night we were staying in Saratoga Springs New York and was going to the best Steak House in town. We all love a good steak and tonight we wanted a good one. We had just ordered our steaks from the waitress, when Food Boy got up to go to the men's room. When he disappeared I got up and found our waitress and told her, to find me the largest steak they had, and make sure to give it to me and I would pay for the difference. I told her why and slipped her a few bucks for doing it. She was in on it, and of course, Food Boy was not to know about what we cooked up (pun intended).

When I came back to my seat I told my other buddy what went on and he couldn't wait to see the look on Food Boy's face. Food Boy came back and we had a few drinks and was waiting for the food. Out she came with our food. She served my other buddy first, then served Food Boy who's eyes were on the two plates eying the steaks up. She then sat down my plate with a steak that was hanging over the sides. Food Boy's eyes bulged as he looked at my steak and started his cry babying about the size of my steak. Well, the two of us just laid it on Food Boy who couldn't believe how much bigger my steak was than his. As I was eating I kept saying how tender and good it was. Yep, I ate the whole thing with nothing left over for Food Boy. For the rest of the trip we would tease Food Boy about that steak.

Till this very day, he never knew how that went down (pun) and we have had many more meals since then. We are still friends and every once in awhile this steak dinner comes up and we laugh about it. Shhhh, don't tell him.

Happy Hour Thank You !!!!!

Thank you Bonanza JellyBean for hosting last night's Happy Hour. I hope you remember most of it. Getting there early with my daughter and seeing you and Snay already there was a good start for a good evening. As the bloggers started to filter in we all got a good chance to get reacquainted. Your pick of Rick's was good and was the food and drinks. Now that being said, I didn't quite catch what you said about Brown, something about stats and exclamation something or the other. Another Jack and Diet Coke Please !!!!!

Snay was looking good from being on his diet. I bought ACW a glass of water. God, can that guy drink. He was still under the weather a little. We were just glad to see him show up.

Linda (Broadsheet) and I were talking when BJB flash her tattoo of a faerie, you know the kind with wings like TinkerBelle. I told Linda that I liked Fairies and left it at that.

Jessica, just got back from Scotland, and she didn't bring any Haggis with her. Russell was with her and it was good to see him again.

It was good to see Cara and Tracy and I am looking forward to the Charm City Roller Girls.

Fool and Eric made their appearance and chatted up. Good to see both of ya!

Mandiferous (Manda Toad) was looking good as always.

Zen Chick I enjoy seeing at the Happy Hours.

Wombat and Sally came in and I got a chance to meet them.

My favorite Steelers fan, Jennetic was her usual sweetheart self. Good to see ya Jenn.

Bryan (Timonium 21093) came for his first Happy Hour. It was good to meet and talk to you. Don't be a stranger.

BJB, was running across the street to some of the other bars, coming back and forth. As far as I know she still had shoes on and didn't lose them.

My daughter enjoy meeting BJB and hopes to see her and everyone else again at the next Happy Hour, and so do I.

The Adventures Of A Summer Cottage

Early last summer my wife and I were invited to a cookout at a friends summer Cottage not far from where we live. It was the first time we were there and I must say it was enjoyable and different. The cookout was the normal good food and drinks, but the Cottage and its surroundings made a big impression on the both of us. It was like living back in the past around the 1940's or 50's. There are about 46 summer Cottages in this place, and all except my friends are one story. They are set about on pathways with roads going around in back of them. Wifey and I fell in love with the place. They are set on about 100 acres of ground with many tall Oak and Maple trees providing much shade. Plenty open spaces with all kinds of walking or biking paths, a natural spring and a stream. We told our friends how much we liked it there, and they showed us a few that were for sale. They were nice and cozy and we enjoyed seeing them. Going home that night, the wife and I kept saying to each other how it reminded us of a movie set from the 40's.

A couple of weeks later we were invited back again on the 4th of July for more fun. They had an open house tour for many of the Cottages and every one was different. The whole place was decorated out with flags and red white and blue everywhere. They had a small parade where everyone was invited to march. Even the dogs had flags, and even Uncle Sam was there in good form. Talk about being patriotic, this was a good ole fashion 4th of July celebration.

The Cottages were built around 1910 and have been lived in every summer since. They are true summer Cottages and for summer use only. They can be occupied from April thru October only. All kinds of people are there, retired to young families. Some live there all summer, while others come and stay for a few days or just for the day. Every person we talked to said that they loved it and especially all the friendly people. (this is starting to sound like a movie or something) It is not a very far drive from where we live and we had no clue about this place, until our first visit there. We took my sister in law and brother in law with us and they had the same feeling about the Cottages as we did. It is something about that place that makes you relax and enjoy being there.

We told them that we were very much considering buying a Cottage. There were only one or two for sale and needed some work. That wouldn't be a problem, as my wife loves to decorate and she knows how. You know what I mean , a wall taken out here, make the bathroom bigger, a little paint here and oh yeah new appliances for the kitchen. She is good at that, and we can do a lot of the work ourselves.

The summer was moving on and I was getting ready to go on my annual fishing trip to a remote area of Quebec Canada for 2 weeks. Off I went, the first and second weeks in August. I always have a good time fishing, but I kept thinking about the Cottages. After my fishing trip and I got settled in at home and my wife wanted us to go see the Cottages again. As we were driving to the Cottages, she said that she had something she wanted to tell me and didn't know how I would react. I said just come out and tell me. She then told me that while I was gone she and her sister had signed a letter of intent on buying one of the Cottages. She wanted to know how I felt about her doing that without me being there and second, that my sister in law and brother in law wanted in. I was quite surprised to say the least as I wasn't expecting that. I do have to say this, my brother in law is more like a brother than a brother in law, and my sister in law is like a sister. That being said, to make this long story a little shorter I liked the idea. It is not like my wife to just go out and sign letters of intent without me. Of course we all had to sign it. It was a good move. Now we had to be approved by the board of directors for the cottages. The land has been owned by some kind of community trust since about 1890. You own the Cottage and can do just about anything you want to it, with some restrictions on the outside. They don't want any odd looking paint jobs etc. You pay small yearly dues which take care of everything on the grounds including your water and maintenance etc. There is a year round caretaker who lives there and he is a good one. You just have to take care of your own Cottage. To Be Continued.

I will post some more on the Adventures Of A Summer Cottage in another blog coming soon to your computer.

What In The Hell Happened ?

Early this morning I was writing up a new post for my blog and after about 1/2 hour it just turned off and I lost everything. I have no clue as to why it happened. It was just like the powers that be said he is taking too long so let us cut him off and they did. Is this something that always happens or what. I was so surprised and pissed off I just walked away from my computer to cool down. I will try again in a little while.

What Is It About E Bay Part 2

In my other post I stated that E Bay was a sellers market. Today's E Bay is a buyers market in places like electronics, videos, cd's etc. In the selling of antiques and collectibles, unless it is a unusual or scarce item it will not bring the money that it once did. E Bay items still sells at a reasonable good price for just about anything other than the most common things. If it is a hot item then the price goes up and up. Bringing a good price is due to the world wide market that E Bay reaches. I don't sell everything I put up for auction, I don't think many sellers do.

When I first started to sell, I would only sell in the USA. I wanted to be paid by check or money order only. This worked well for a long time. I didn't want to sell world wide because the shipping and insurance costs are different then selling here in the good ole USA. Also, you had to fill out all kinds of customs forms. It could be intimidating. My sales were good selling here in the USA and I was happy with that. I started to get e mails from people all over the world asking if I would ship to them. At first I said no and thanks for inquiring.

Pay Pal which is now owned by E Bay became an easy way to pay for the things I bought and if the seller accepted Pay Pal that cut out the time consuming check writing and mailing etc. Paying by Pay Pal was a great way to pay for things you won in the auction. The seller also sent your item very quickly since they had been paid already. I liked Pay Pal. The e mails were stilling coming asking me to sell to people world wide. I was considering it and also considering using Pay Pal to get paid by my bidders. I did set up my Pay Pal account to accept credit cards. The cost was just under 4 per cent. With my Pay Pal account set up to be able to pay and receive money, I then started to accept bids from all over the world. It work so much better than I expected. I became a Power Seller on E Bay. E Bay invites you to become a Power Seller, you can't just ask to join. My sales were flying high and I was getting much higher bids than when I sold just in the USA. The combination of selling worldwide and especially having Pay Pal to receive money from credit cards was the key. Most sellers accept Pay Pal now. There are still a few who want their money by check or M.O. and that is just fine. I still get paid that way and if the buyer has good feedback I don't hold their item till their check clears. I just mail it when the check arrives and I have never had a bad check and my customer appreciate it.

One of the things I do is to mail the buyer their item within a day or so and I send just about everything by Priority Mail. It gets to the buyer in 2 or 3 days and the buyers love it. The nice thing about Priority Mail is that the Post Office supplies all of the boxes, labels and stickers for mailing and it is all free. You can order everything on line from the Post Office and get different sizes. I do buy larger boxes for when I need them, but the Post Office Priority Boxes and envelopes just about covers 98 Per Cent of my shipping needs.

Getting back to shipping world wide. I talked to the counter people at the P. O. about what I needed to do to ship world wide. They have booklets on just about whatever you needed to know. Also you can go on line and figure out how much it will cost to ship world wide and what insurance costs. You can fill out the customs form at home or at the P.O. they will help you out. Just remember that the buyer pays for all the shipping costs and insurance. You will need a scale to weigh your packages so you can tell your buyer what the costs are. All of the charts for different countries or zip codes that you will need, you can get at the P.O.

Good communication with your buyer or seller goes a long way to having good experiences on E Bay. My bad experiences on E Bay are minimal. My feedback is 100 % good. Misunderstandings do happen and if you communicate they can be cleared up.

Standing Cheese (SC) brings up a good point in his comment on my post E Bay part 1 above, about the seller at times being at the mercy of the buyer. I have to agree with his comment. E Bay also takes a stance to let the buyer and seller work it out and they stay out of it. E Bay doesn't always respond to your problem and if they do you don't get much in the way of relief or help. E Bay good or bad, it is a great experience. I love it.

What Is It About E Bay Part 1

Back in the mid 1990's I started to buy on E Bay. I would buy and sometimes sell through a friends account until I got my own E Bay account. Back then it was a sellers market. You would bid and if you were the winning bidder you would exchange information. Back then you would e mail the seller to get their name and address while giving them your shipping information. Most sellers would only accept checks or money orders. If you sent a check they would hold the item you bought until the check cleared, which could be up to 2 weeks. If it was a Money Order they would ship soon after receiving same. You would have to put the E Bay item # on your check, on the envelope or any other paper you included. This took time and was a pain in the ass, as E Bay at that time didn't have the set up as they do now for tracking your transaction.

Feedback was the way bidders and sellers could tell if someone had a good or bad reputation. It was important to leave feedback for a seller or buyer. It was more important to the sellers as the buyers sent the money and if it cleared you would have good feedback. Sellers on the other hand had to have good feedback or buyers wouldn't buy from them. There are plenty horror stories about both sellers and buyers trying to cheat each other. Even today this goes on.

You have to remember this, if you bid on any item, you are entering into a contract to pay for whatever you bid on. No buyers remorse, no backing out for any reason, yet this still goes on. It costs the seller time and money when this happens.

E Bay today takes a good learning curve to be a good seller. You have to know what category to use, a good description of what you are selling, good photos and what day and time to have in appear on E Bay. It can be very time consuming selling on E Bay.

Sometimes I would have as many as 40 items up for auction and sometimes none. I am glad I don't have to do this 24/7. I enjoy putting things for sale on E Bay and I am also a buyer. I can spend a lot of time checking out what is selling and what is not.

E Bay has a lot to be desired in certain things, but it also can be a hell of a lot of fun. More later about E Bay in part 2 when I get some more time.

A Good Showing, But Not The Ravens

Yesterday at our brunch, we had a very good turnout. The crowd of friends and family ate, drank, and was merry for over 2 hours. The Bloody Marys were good and kept flowing through out the brunch. I made up the pitchers of Bloody Marys , but didn't make them too hot so some that can't stand the heat could drink them. That worked out well. I did have all the goodies for making them as hot as you wanted and some of us took advantage of the heat. I had all kinds of hot sauces, old bay, and some of the hottest horse radish that I have had in a long time. I love it when horse radish opens up all your sinuses with just a little whiff. The Mimosas were good, but the Bloody Marys won hands down.

The food was excellent and it was all home made except for the Bagels. The very large ham was not very large when we got done with it. It was enough left for some sandwiches and with eggs for breakfast.

The Ravens game started and by then the Brunch was winding down as most of the people were leaving. I watched as the Ravens gave away the game and decided there is always next year. The Ravens ended up tied with the Browns at 6 and 10 for last place. We got into 3rd place instead of last because we had won more games in our division then Cleveland. I am glad it ended this way, because of the standings in our division we get to play The Tennessee Titans next season in Tennessee. This means I get to see the Ravens play the Titans in Tennessee with my son who is a Titans fan. If the Ravens or the Titans don't shape up next season it won't matter who wins, just like this year.

Happy New Year They Will Be Coming Soon

The they I am talking about are friends and family coming to my house for a New Years Day Brunch. They will be pouring in around 11 a.m. to imbibe on Bloody Mary's, Mimosa's and all other kinds of breakfast drinks. Some of the foods being served are several Quiche dishes, Casseroles, all sorts of Bagels, some meats, finger food, and God know what else. If they don't get enough to eat and drink, shame on them.

This brunch started last year on New Years Day and many of our friends asked us if we were going to have it this year. We were, and it grew. It is nice to have everyone over and to chill out. Besides the Ravens Game comes on at 1 p.m.