Palin-Mobile Sighting & my 2004 Nissan Quest

My car has been acting weird all week. Idling funny. When I'm at a stoplight it kinda rumbles and shimmies. Then yesterday it wouldn't start at the first turn of the key. Kept getting weirder until finally last night the "service engine soon" light came on.

Now, my car isn't very old. It's a 2004 Nissan Quest. The first year of the "new and improved" model. This model has been nothing but a headache since we got it. The warrantee covered MANY repairs the first year:

1. 6 Disc CD player held my CD ransomed and we had to get a whole new player and wait a few months for Nissan Central to send my CD's back to me.
2. Navigation system had to be replaced. Twice.
3. DVD player had to be replaced
4. Sunroof had to be repaired because the seal on it made my front drivers window leak in the rain (Sidenote: if this ever happens to you just shove a maxi-pad between the window and the visor. Works well)
5. Rotors that turned the brakes had to be replaces.
6. New tires lived under 20,000 miles instead of the 50,000 that they're supposed to last. Apparently that is an ongoing problem with this make/model.
7. Automatic trunk wouldn't close.

Nissan offered us a "GREAT DEAL" on a newer model as a way to apologize. Unfortunately we couldn't afford to deal with them.


So we took it to the local Nissan dealer this morning and dropped it off. While I was waiting in the church van in the parking lot for hubby to reappear I looked out and saw the McCain/Palin tour bus! Sarah stayed in a little chain hotel right in Altoona last night and her bus was waiting for her!

Too cool. I drove over and snapped a few pics with my phone. What did we ever do before camera phones?
I tried to talk my husband into waiting for Sarah to appear but he said we needed to go.
I really wanted to wait for Sarah and tell her she has my vote and that I could care less where she gets her clothes.

October in PA

October has always been my favorite month. October in PA is why. The colors are breathtaking. The smell of the leaves is lovely. The crunch of the leaves under my feet while I walk makes me feel like a child again. The warm days and the cool brisk nights.

I love fall!

For Young Men Only

For Young Men Only: A Guy's Guide to the Alien Gender








I have spoken highly of the For Men Only and For Women Only Books by Jeff & Shaunti Feldhan for several years. I believe that all married couples should read these books. Finally there is one specifially aimed towards teenage boys. For Young Men Only hits the stores this week and it is just as important, if not more, than the books the preceeded it. God made male and female so amazingly different and while we may think we understand the other there is no way to fully know what's going on inside them without some kind of guidebook. For Young Men Only is that guidebook for teenage boys to understand (or at least try to!) the workings of the mind of the teenage girl. I read this and was surprised at how dead-on it is. "Oh yeah, I was like that..." "Yeah, that's still the way I am..." and "Honey, this is how I feel..." (as I showed it to my husband of nearly 17 years!) are just a few of the statements I burst out with while reading it. I immediately passed it on to my teenage son who devoured it within days. I want to send a huge thank you to Jeff Feldhahn, Eric RIce and Shaunti Feldhahn for writing such an important little book. This book (along with the entire series) has the potential to be life changing and can help young men now as they enter the world of dating and later as they enter the life of marriage.
To purchase this book go here: http://www.amazon.com/Young-Men-Only-Guide-Gender/dp/160142020X
It would make a great gift for the young man in your life. You can also direct them to www.foryoungmenonly.com for more information.

Some favorite youtube videos

Need more tea!

I need to go to the tea shop and get more loose leaf tea. I'm starting to rely on it. It is indeed my drug of choice. The coconut is my favorite this season!

I've always loved tea and I've gone through many seasons of it. In college I was addicted to blueberry herbal tea. So good, it tasted like blueberry pie.

Then I went through my Tazo Chai phase. That lasted several years.

Now I've graduated to loose leaf. And I've abandoned herbal tea. No green, red or white for me either. Green tea of course is known for it's benefits, but IMO no benefit is good enough to make me drink that stuff.

Bring on the black tea! And flavored black tea is all the better!

But I do have my limits there too. No Earl Grey. English Breakfast is my favorite "unflavored" black tea.

Now aren't you glad you know all that?