Be Safe -- Keep Yourself "Alarmed"

GREAT IDEA: Put your car keys beside your bed at night. If you hear a noise outside your home or someone trying to get into your house, just press the panic button for your car. The alarm will be set off, and the horn will continue to sound until you turn it off or the car battery dies.

Test areas of the house first to see if there is an area that the alarm will not activate from the key ring. It will go off from almost anywhere inside your home and your vehicle will continue honking until your battery runs down or until you reset it with the button on the key fob chain. It works in your driveway or in your garage.

If your car alarm goes off when someone is trying to break in your house, odds are the burglar or rapist won't stick around. After a few seconds all your neighbors will be looking out their windows to see who is out there and a criminal won't want that.

And remember to carry your keys while walking to your car in a parking lot. The alarm can work the same way there.

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I came, I saw, I shopped.

Last night I drove over to Michael's Arts and Crafts just before it closed and bought a bunch of card-making crafts -- stamps, wire mesh, ink pens... Jackie went overboard on the gift card. I will have to go overboard on the thank-you card I send her to express my gratitude...

Tonight I went to Wal-Mart and bought two small fans, plus a wee personal fan that I can hang around my neck when I get overly warm at work, and two new pillows and pillow cases with the card my nephew and niece gave me for turning 56. I got something like Gatorade, too, because they were running a sale and I was hot and thirsty (hence three fans...and by now I'm water-logged, to boot!)

I still have a Borders card that someone gave me at work. (Only one of the gifts at work had the name of the giver attached to it, so I am unable to identify the Borders gift giver.) I'll take that for a drive soon and get something wonderful with it, too...

Today I was chewing on a couple of Milk Duds at work and pulled one of the caps off a back tooth, so tomorrow at 7 a.m. I will be in a dentist's chair having it reattached. I am contemplating sending the candy maker the bill. I didn't know those things were cap-stealers. Shouldn't there be a warning on the box? "Caution: Chew at your own risk if the dentition presently in your mouth did not come from the hand of God in your sixth or seventh year of life."

My semi-annual dental cleaning is scheduled for next Tuesday but, with a little bit of luck, perhaps I can get that taken care of tomorrow, too, so I don't have to take time from work next week. I'll see if I can beg really cute after the cap is firmly attached again. If begging doesn't work, perhaps as I leave the building I'll trip someone on the way in who's scheduled for the hygienist at the time I could be having it done if he or she weren't scheduled for it. (My sense of humor is not born again. It's still the same sick thing it has always been... fodder for the Comedy Central Channel - Hades Campus.) (Shame on me!)

I was in a dentist chair one time for another "trauma" malady. I had been chewing on a salty snack and either chipped a tooth or tore loose another (or the same) cap. When the dentist asked me what had caused the trouble, I quite honestly reported, "I was eating corn nuts." His mouth twisted into a pruny-looking knot as he contemplated the information and then he drily offered his professional opinion: "You may as well chew gravel, for all the difference it makes to your teeth." I almost wet myself laughing -- and I have never chewed corn nuts since.

I suppose now I will have to swear off Milk Duds as well. The Golden Years are beginning to lose their allure. Guess I'll have to gum Thin Mints or pudding from now on!