Kim's Thoughts
Just a few thoughts I feel worthy of jotting down!
What I Love About Sanford
There are many things I love about Sanford! To avoid missing something that I really need to pay tribute to, here are the top five CATEGORIES (with examples in each) that make Sanford a great place to live – in no particular order:
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The many great places to go and have a relaxing time: The Temple Theater, Depot Park, Kiwanis Park, Downtown, the duck pond in Riverbirch Corner, SanLee Park, movie theaters, and on and on….
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The great restaurants, including, but definitely not limited to: Renalds, Myra’s Kitchen, The Dairy Bar, Fresh Choice Cafe, The Bavarian Brat Haus, Angie’s Breakfast Barn, Mrs. Wenger’s, Mrs. Lacey’s, The Flame, Davison’s Steaks, River Lodge, and others I’m sure I’m forgetting at the moment!
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The best places in the world to take care of my dogs – All Animals Veterinary Hospital (especially Dr. Cindy) and Rae-Zor Grooming, Boarding, and Day Care!
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LOTS of places to go get the perfect massage, facial, pedicure, manicure, or other pampering services at reasonable prices – Natural Balance, Marcello’s, Love Nails, Head To Toe – just to name the ones that I have used over the years.
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The pace and proximity to ways to have a change of pace — it is more upbeat in Sanford than the small farming community I grew up in, but still a long way from the hustle and bustle of big city life. I love that it has that small town feel, but still offers a lot of what a mid-sized city has to offer. And, if the urge for more excitement grabs you, it is just a little ways away. Being in the “heart of Carolina”, Sanford is centrally located with easy access to just about anywhere! Both the mountains and the beaches are just a short driving distance away – you can easily do either in a day trip or even, if you so desire, do both in a weekend!! If you’re craving the city life, you can drive in no time to Raleigh, Greensboro, Winston-Salem, Charlotte. Theme parks your cup of tea? It is a short drive to Carowinds, Kings Dominion, Busch Gardens, and several water parks! Local shopping is worth staying in town for – lots of quaint locally owned shops downtown and around town, and a few big box stores, like Penneys, Belk, WalMart, etc……..but, if you really need Target, PetSmart, or the “mall experience”, it is a short drive to Cary, Raleigh, Southern Pines, or Fayetteville!
So, there you have it!!!
Saturday Ponderings
I love Bazarro!!! You know, the cartoon in the comic section of the newspaper! Today, they highlight the widespread popularity of blogging. Not only are our Sanford area bloggers growing, but even some of the most unusual people blog – as depicted in today’s Bazarro:
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Did George Norman close his store on Wicker Street???? I drove by there the other day and noticed all the windows and doors covered up with paper. Also, it was during business hours and they were not open!!! I really enjoy that shop and have picked up some really nice gifts in there! I hope they are just renovating or something – I’d hate to hear that they are closed!!!
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Four Corners Framing looked like it was closed last week when I went by there, too – but that wasn’t as obvious as George Norman was!!! I sure hope we aren’t losing some of the great locally owned shops downtown!
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I haven’t been out and about town the last few days — I am involved in something that I’ll be blogging about in a few days, so not a lot of local interest stuff to post about! But soon……I promise!!!
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I can’t wait for “Ain’t Misbehavin'” to open at the Temple Theater!!!! It is running May 29th thru June 22nd! I’m sad that it is the last show of the season, but I think this show is a great one to close the season — going out with a bang!!! I think some friends and I are planning to go on the 12th, but I don’t know if I can wait that long — I just may have to sneak off and go see it long before that!
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As for the Yankees — I do believe my post that declared to the world that I am convinced they can make a comeback and that I am NOT a fair weather fan WORKED!!! If I have read the game results correctly, they haven’t lost a game since that post – and I believe they have played about 3 since then! WOO HOO!!! Way to go, Yanks — keep up the good work!!!
I think that is all for now…..good night!
20 Years! And a couple other minor thoughts!
I don’t normally talk about my work on here – with the exception of when I felt the strong urge to brag about my promotion! But today, I have another strong urge to brag about something work related, so here we go!!!
As of today – May 23rd – I have worked at my current employer for 20 years! Yep, that is TWENTY years! The name has changed a few times over the years due to changes in the parent company, but it is the same place!
That makes me an odd duck in this day and age. You used to see people get a job and stay there for years and years to gain the security that seniority used to bring them – not so much anymore. People tend to do more job hopping now for a variety of reasons. My reason for staying has very little to do with the security of seniority (no such thing in Corporate America anymore!). I stay because I have a job that is extremely rewarding and gives me an opportunity to do something I love to do every day without becoming monotonous! The time has flown by – it sure doesn’t feel like 20 years has passed! And – I can count the # of times on one hand that I can remember having to convince myself of one good reason to get out of bed and go in to work over the past 20 years! Can’t beat that with a stick!
For the major anniversary milestones, we get to select a gift of our choice from a wide variety of items based on the # of years. I selected a beautiful pearl and diamond ring for my 20 year gift – I love it!!! But it is just icing on the cake of a long and satisfying career!
OK – brag session is over! Now for a few other thoughts I have on this lovely Friday morning:
Am I the only one who just can’t get used to no stop light on the corner of Gordon St. and Steele St.? I’m not sure when that stop light went away – it has been maybe a couple years – but, every time I come down through there, I look up to that light and it is GONE!!! When I’m going down Steele, I prepare to stop and look up to see if it is green or red – no light! When I’m on Gordon, I stop for the stop sign (probably less because I notice the stop sign and more because that way was usually red until it was tripped), but then I sit there waiting for the light to turn green – no light! I am not sure how long it will take me to get it through my thick head that THERE IS NO TRAFFIC LIGHT ON THE CORNER OF GORDON AND STEELE ANYMORE!!! ha-ha-ha
I gotta get up to Big Bloomers to get some hanging plants for my deck and patio!! It is already Memorial Day weekend and no pretty plants hanging around to enjoy! The guys I have that keep up my lawn and do my landscaping have done all the spring sprucing up, so the yard is beautiful — but the deck and patio need those plants!!!
Speaking of the guys who keep up my lawn and landscaping — they are WONDERFUL!! I have asthma, so mowing the lawn ends up with an inhaler and a couple hours of wheezing and gasping for breath! I love to mow the lawn, but had to stop doing it myself – my solution was to get someone to do it for me. I also needed to have some landscaping done when I first bought my house. I called around to find out who could do a good job without charging an arm and a leg. Chris Harrington was recommended to me – he and his brother Brandon have Harrington’s Lawn Care and Landscaping. They had so many great ideas – I just let him go at it! I call them my “elves” because I go to work and the lawn needs to be mowed or bushes need to be trimmed and I come home and it is all done and beautiful – the elves had been there!!! They are GREAT!!! I have enjoyed their work at my home for about 3 years now – they keep my lawn looking great year round (and it really needed attention when I bought the house), added and maintain my landscaping, and even put in a wonderful patio!
I guess that’s all for now!
Rae-Zor Grooming, Boarding, & Day Care
I like to take them every now and then for a day of Doggie Day Care so they can play with other dogs and have some time out of their normal environment! And it is always the 1st choice for boarding! They have HUGE temperature controlled comfortable kennels, a great outdoor play area, indoor play areas, and lots of people and other dogs to meet and have fun with! They always come home totally exhausted and happy!!!
For this visit, they will have lots of fun, get baths, and pedicures — so, they’ll have a nice mix of play and pampering — what more can a dog ask for????
Let’s Go Yankees, Let’s Go!
All that said — I also have to say that I am NOT a fair weather fan!!! NO, SIR!!! The Yanks are in a slump this year (well, let’s call a spade a spade — they’re scraping the bottom of the standings board) — but, they are still the Yankees and I’m still rooting for them to make one of their infamous come backs and get a good rally going to spring into first place and make it to the series — and I’ll be doing that until the day the series starts – with or without them! ha-ha-ha
Seriously — the Yanks have had their golden years and their not so golden years, but I’ve stuck with them! I don’t understand these folks who call themselves die hard fans, but go nuts and bad mouth their team when they are having a tough time — that’s when they need their fans the most!!!
So — Let’s Go, Yankees, Let’s Go!!!! You can do it — you’ve come from behind to win it all before — you can do it again!!!!
(But, then again, coming in dead last just may be the kick that Steinbrenner and his merry men need to show them that they can’t treat people the way they do and keep staying on top…..)
And The Trophy Goes To….
The winner in the 6th season of Dancing With The Stars is Kristie! It was sorta anti-climatic because she was the odds-on fan favorite from the beginning and was at the top of the leader board almost every week! Barring an upset, she was a shoe in!
Don’t mistake the last paragraph to mean I didn’t enjoy this season! I DID!!! It was full of excitement, drama, and amazing accomplishments from all the contestants! It was also the first season that the fan voting didn’t seem out of whack! In past seasons, the popularity of some contestants kept them on long after they were obviously no longer a valid contender AND some that were amazing and should have made it much further went home early because they just didn’t get the fan votes!!! This season, it progressed much more in line with the abilities of the contestants – although it got tough towards the end cause they all deserved to go all the way, but one had to go home each week!!!
It was a great season — my only negative was that tonight’s show was very anti-climatic — there was no surprise ending – no “gee, I wonder who’s gonna win”! The recap of the highlights from the season was nice, but I saw it all when it happened —- so, basically, I didn’t need to bother watching tonight at all! I could have just confirmed my suspicions by reading about Kristie on line! But, then, if there HAD been an upset, I would have drop kicked myself into the middle of next week for missing it!!!! ha-ha-ha-ha-ha
Now it is over — and I’m already wondering who will be in the line up of stars for NEXT season and looking forward to it starting!!!!
Don’t Try This….
I was at the monthly CIS Board meeting after work. When it adjourned, some of us mingled a little and then I stood outside talking to our Executive Director about some things we need to get done and we looked up at the sky and decided we’d better head home to try to avoid being out in what was obviously going to be a nasty storm. I no more than got in my car and it started to rain. Now, I’m not squeamish about these things — so I had to drive in the rain — no big deal — at least I wasn’t out walking in it!!! So, I headed toward The Dairy Bar to get some supper. As I crossed Horner, it started coming down REALLY hard, so I switched gears (in my mind – not the car) and headed toward McDonald’s to just go through the drive thru. Well, I stopped at the first 4-way there on Gulf Street and started hearing these enormously loud bangs on the roof and then saw the hail hitting the hood of my car — no, not just hail — BOULDERS!!!! It was deafening in the car!!!! The hail was bouncing off the hood and crashing against the windows and bombarding the roof – the rag top roof ————— I was suddenly petrified that it was going to break a window or damage the roof or the paint!!!! And it got really eerie out — a strange gray haze, driving rain you could barely see through, and that hail!!!!!! Supper was no longer a priority — I needed to get my butt home!!!!! It was not a pleasant drive up Hawkins with traffic moving at a snail’s pace and barely able to see beyond the front end of the car — but, I wasn’t about to stop!!!
I made it home OK and pulled the pony into the garage — no damage!!!! BUT – I have a headache, stiff neck, and aching shoulders ——- time to order a pizza and wind down with the season finale of Dancing With The Stars!!!!
A Real Treat….
Vote For Sanford Bloggers – Best of Blog Awards
In the Category of Best New Blog: The Harlands
Get those votes out — let’s make sure at least one of us win!!!!
YAWN!
Today was one of those days — I didn’t go anywhere or do anything! And now, after a long rough day of being lazy, the girls are snoring at my feet and I am yawning and ready for bed!
Kim's Thoughts 
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