Most people want to be in better shape. They commit themselves to working out a few times a week but they don’t really work it. What most people do not realize is that when they work out they are supposed to feel sore. That soreness is the feeling of muscle building and growing. I know plenty of people who will stop working out for a week or so because they are sore. What they don’t understand is that when they do, they are losing all of the progress that they had just made. There are better ideas then just stopping. These ideas will let you still workout but you will not have to work the sore parts.

What people should do is alternate the parts of their body that they work. For example, one day they should focus only on upper body. Do work outs like bench presses and curls. On another day you should do only lower body workouts such as front and back squats. Using these methods you can continue to work out every day without worrying about being too sore. These methods will still make you sore but that’s part of what working out does. I have found that P90X is a great way to alternate workouts and get good results.

Learning to drive can be very stressful for the person learning, the teacher and the parents. This is especially true if you don’t feel like paying for a driver’s education class and your parent is the teacher. This means all parties have to stay calm. That is truer for the teacher because if the teacher is freaking out about every little thing then the driver will not be able to learn anything. Its chaos and totally unmanageable and places unneeded stress on everyone involved.

The teacher needs to be calm and supportive and start out very slow. That way the driver’s confidence can work its way up. Starting out small lets the driver learn how to control the vehicle and all the little things that go along with that. Breaking smoothly, turning, and turn signals are all things that should be learned before actually getting on the road. And even when you get there, you should go easy.

Take back roads and roads that aren’t used very often or by lots of people. Guide the driver through these places if he or she is unfamiliar with them. Once they get the hang of the road, then they can learn to navigate themselves. And eventually you can turn the driver loose to be on their own even though you may want to ground them until they are thirty!

Have you ever really had to use the restroom and there was no good place in sight? You don’t want to go to a gross gas station or McDonalds. Now that is just nasty and nobody wants to have to do that. I was in this awful situation the other day and I can tell you it wasn’t fun.

There are a few easy fixes for this. Some are easier than others. The easiest and, let’s face it, a classic, is to just go in an empty bottle of some sort. Water, Coke, Gatorade. Anything will do in this situation. Another thing you can do is look around for a nice grocery store. In my experience, nice grocery stores have very nice restrooms. I understand that there may not be a nice grocery near by but even a sub-par grocery is better than a convenience store.

So over all there are some good choices out there. And when disaster strikes let’s just hope you have one of these choices available to you. If not, you may have to use the bottle method. But that’s better than nothing.

Do you ever watch children’s movie that you enjoyed as a kid nowadays. I always enjoy it because there are so many things I actually understand now that I am a little bit older. I think that filmmakers do this on purpose so that even people of all ages can enjoy their films.

Two great examples of these are Shrek and the Wizard of Oz. In the Wizard of Oz one of the witch’s evil tricks is to cover the yellow brick in poppy flowers. This reference just flew right over my head as a child. Now I understand that poppy becomes heroin and heroin makes people drowsy. That got a little chuckle out of me last night. Shrek also has some great ones. My favorites are the Donkeys constant musical references. One thing I’d like to say is that in my opinion, Donkey has a great taste in music. Now that I have become more familiar with music, his character is that much more enjoyable.

There are plenty more examples than these but those were just to name a few. I think it’s a good idea for people to go back and enjoy some of the older movies to see how much more they like them now. It might just be a good idea.

My step father in a general physician and the senior partner in his practice so he was one of the doctors I spoke to about healthcare. In the beginning he was all for the changes that were being proposed and then something changes; it became about the insurance industry and not about the care that we get from our doctors and hospitals. No one is arguing that we should do nothing; the question is what do we do?

Today it was released that the average American spends 17% of their total income on healthcare. That’s over a third of the average American’s mortgage payment since most house payments cannot exceed 45% to be approved. That is a staggering amount of your household income spent on healthcare but again; what do we need to do? I suggest you ask your doctor on your next appointment and find out what he or she thinks they need us to fight for in order to improve care. When I have asked mine the questions they had said some very smart and creative things. We should be talking to the people who take care of patients and NOT the administration big wigs whose only job is to make a lot of money. Until we get our priorities straight, a solution will never be found.

Children are not inclined to go outdoors and play. Why would they when the TV, video games, and the home computer as entertainment all call them to stay indoors and “play”? This is a shame because with the denial of the outdoors, the environment becomes more and more disconnected. The kids today will one day grow up to be the voting adults of tomorrow and why would they vote for public funding of National Parks and for legislation to protect the environment. And why would they care when the environment has always been climate controlled and defined by four walls and a roof.

How can we encourage our children to play outdoors like we did if we are so afraid of the outdoors. The media has made us all so painfully aware of the multitudes of dangers to our children what with child molesters and child murderers to bird-flu carrying birds to West Nile Virus carrying mosquitoes. We all need to revisit the concept of outdoors and we need to start with our own backyards, in our own patios and gardens. First steps are always the closest to home and then we can venture forth to explore the great big world outdoors.

Two years ago my husband and I thought we were doing the right thing when we put in a raised garden bed to grow organically grown herbs and vegetables.  We did so much research on the plants, the soil and the pesticides/herbicides we should stay away from as well as water runoff.  We thought we had done everything right including stopping using fertilizers on our lawn.  Then we found out that by using treated timber to build the beds we were introducing the toxic chemicals into the bed.  Last fall we replaced everything with real organic raised bed kits made of cedar.

Now that the beds have been replaced we are again planting and making sure we are doing everything we can to make sure we have good clean, natural food to eat. Though I know it’s not as important to everyone to go to the trouble we have, it is important to have good food to eat at your disposal.  Whether they are organic or not, I highly recommend the raised garden kits for the ease they bring when planting, watering and caring for your plants.  There is no better way to garden!

One of the things we don’t consider when we think about storage is the convenience of having that storage available 24/7, 365 days a year and the only way you can have this is having a storage shed on your property. Most people have one shed and while that works really well, having a shed that is dedicated to you backyard work and activities can make your life incredibly easy especially if you also garden.

Having your tools and equipment at your fingertips and always in their place when you are looking for them makes life easy and that is always a good thing. Don’t you think it’s time to get serious about your backyard shed? Make your gardening more fum with good, organized storage!

I live in the South and in the South you seldom get the “Winter Wonderland” that you hear about in the Christmas songs and see on so many postcards. However, it looks like we are in for a blast of old man winter in the next few days. When that blast comes you will find a lot of crazy people on the roads down here! Most have never lived in a Northern state so they have never driven with snow tires or had a lesson for how to steer in a slide when driving in the snow as it’s totally opposite of how you would think it was to steer.

I suggest, as well as I will be doing, to go get enough groceries to last you until temperatures get above the freezing mark and make sure you have a full tank of gas just in case you have an emergency and have to get out. You don’t want to get caught in a traffic situation and run out of gas. If you have to travel for work, please give the guy in front of you four to five times more space than you normally do as this is a major contributor to accidents in ice and snow. Other than that, dress warm and keep your walks and driveway as clear as you can (A broom works wonders in powdered snow) and good luck!

I friend and I went to see a movie a few days before Christmas and if anyone was wondering if people had gone out to the malls, I can testify that they were out in droves! The traffic was awful and wonderful at the same time. The awful part was the part we all hate; the waiting, taking of turns and wanting to flip people off that were a bit out of control behind the wheel. (We didn’t though in adhering to the Christmas spirit of the holidays)

The really good part though was that so many were out shopping for gifts. This seems to be a very good sign that the retail sector might be bouncing back after a very tough year. Granted, I don’t know how many of these people were going to a movie like we were or if they were out to get the best deals; but I do know there was a lot of them and for the first time in months the parking lot was full and people were everywhere. I hope it is a Merry Christmas to everyone; including those in the retail business.