Cheryl Beckham

For some reason I have gotten into watching MTV’s hit series Teen Mom and Teen Mom 2. I don’t know why it interests me so much but it seems to catch my attention when I’m channel surfing and I find it on. I feel so bad for these young kids that have found themselves in an adult situation and for the most part they are not handling well what-so-ever. And most of all my hearts go out to these babies that were born to babies.

One of my favorite shows to watch on TV is “How It’s Made” which comes on the Science Channel almost every day. No matter what it is that they are showing us, I learn something interesting, fascinating and/or entertaining, which I can’t say about any other show that my current satellite provider offers us.

There’s a grocery store in Europe that makes our little ’self-checkout’ lines look obsolete already.  In Germany, there’s a grocery store that you take your cell phone, scan the items with it that you put in your shopping cart and then when you get to the check out, your cell phone will display a bar code for everything you scanned total, the check out person scans that and you pay and out you go.

So it looks like we’re not only looking at advances in grocery shopping but also in cell phones.  At the check out, once you scan the payment bar code, you can pay by cash, credit card, debit card or fingerprint (after you have signed up for fingerprint shopping).  And the politicians wonder why we are falling behind the rest of the world where technology is concerned.

Years ago I must have expressed out loud in front of someone, somewhere, something about the cuteness of a frog lawn ornament, that had caught my eye, for some reason. I didn’t even buy the frog, but some how that was to be the start of the many, many frogs that have now seemingly taken over my house and lawn. Word got out and frogs are a constant, but welcomed gesture from folks, as a gift, a token, a present, a tip (after all, I am a bar tender, and we receive quite a variety of tips now and then) from virtually everywhere from all types of people that I have/had a relationship with over the years. I must have a frog made out of any and every type of material that is known to man, in all kinds of sizes, and stances.

For Christmas I was given a frog aquarium kit, which requires a check to be sent in with the order for the frogs to come in the mail, or I could go down to one of the many pet stores that have popped up all over the place in the past few years. I’m sure at least one will have baby frogs for sale, it seems like the more humane way to receive new members of the family. But going to the pet stores, any of them like PetCo, Puppy Palace, and Petsmart always leaves me with me wallet emptied out and my heart broken from not being able to take home more of the critters that are all there, just waiting for a home, and knowing that their chances of being purchased and treated adequately highly reduces most of their survival rates.

One of the places that I try not to go in to are the A.S.P.C.A. and Animal Shelters, I have never left one yet with out crying like a baby and feeling like a piece of scum, and dirty. Not something that I enjoy or look forward to doing, ever.

I just don’t know how my friend Oneida does it. She home schools both of her kids and has been doing so since day one and they are now 13 (girl) and 8 (boy). She stays home while her hubby works two jobs to support them and they are one of the happiest couples that I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing. 

With money always an issue with everyone these days, even working two jobs, she is always looking for a good discount school supplycompany to help with all of the school supplies that are necessary in teaching both of their kids. And with such a gap in the two kids ages I would imagine that they would need so many things for each of them that are age appropriate. The Internet is a wonderful resource that they use all the time for research, learning as well as finding things that they need to purchase and this site Constructiveplaythings.com has the kind of variety that I think will be great for them.

So I am going on Face Book later on today and send her a message with the link in it in hopes that it will help her out some.