Booney

You got me thinking about that, @Coffeecup. I can't remember any recent photos of her with current hosts, although I think she was hanging out with Albany while Albany was still employed there. She posts a lot of pics of her with former hosts, like Kathy Levine, and with vendors as you mentioned. Did Mary Beth's son get married since Lisa left? I seem to recall lots of wedding photos with Q hosts, but I can't remember if Lisa was in them.

Not contradicting at all - how non-competes are enforced can vary by state and by industry. There have been cases where the non-compete only specified that you can't solicit customers if you leave, not that you can't work for a competitor. There have been court cases where a judge decided that to prevent a terminated employee - who had a non-compete - from working for a competitor for a period of time was too much of a hardship on the former employee. So there are a number of ways they can be written and enforced (or not). One industry I worked in that had non-competes was not a direct-to-consumer industry. They tended to be less concerned about the non-compete when someone was laid off, or otherwise terminated.

It's probably likely that's what they did, @Fishy. Especially if they gave her some sort of severance package - often those come with strings attached like agreeing not to sue, not discussing the details of her departure, etc. Non-competes usually last a year or 18 months, but since she most likely didn't leave on her own, I don't think it would come into play here. If they terminated her (or didn't renew her contract), they can't really prevent her from finding work by forcing her to honor a non-compete (again, unless they're paying her severance for a period of time). If she left on her own, however, that would be a different story. She would be subject to any non-compete agreement in place.

I saw Fleetwood Mac a number of years ago during one of their reunion tours. Everyone was on the tour including Christine McVie. The show was at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City and it was wonderful. Since then, I've seen Stevie Nicks' solo show twice. She's still the bomb! She can't quite hit all the high notes any more, but she still sounds fantastic. When she sings "Landslide," it still gives me goosebumps. I also saw a Lindsey Buckingham solo show a number of years ago. He's really an amazing guitarist. FM was just such an incredibly talented group.

I have those spots too, @zoemom - my dermatologist wittily calls them "wisdom spots." Like you, I got sunburns every summer growing up because, in that era, we didn't know that it was bad for you. I grew up in coastal Connecticut and we lived a few minutes from a beach. We went to the beach pretty much every day in the summer from the time I was in elementary school through high school. Not only did I not use sunscreen, I remember slathering baby oil on me to get a darker tan. I'm a fair-skinned blonde, so needless to say, this was not good for me. I faithfully go to my dermatologist for regular skin checks, and those age wisdom spots scare me too, but so far, so good.

I bought several small Tig cross-body bags last year that are all leather. I got them at a department store, not a shopping channel. The lining isn't as silky and pretty as Tig linings used to be, but the bag is still well-made. I bought the first one and loved it so much, I bought it in every color I could find. I use them constantly and they are holding up well. The style or model is "Heritage" - Adorable! I'd want to have them where I could see them constantly, so your living room sounds like a good place to put them!

I suffered through a few minutes of it, fast forwarding through 90% of it. The show is spectacularly awful IMO and Lisa being there was just a waste. She said the least of the four judges - even the young actor from The Real O'Neals had a lot more to say! A couple of things at the beginning made me laugh. They introduced the Real O'Neals guy by naming his show, but for Lisa they just said "Lisa Robertson!" I'm guessing there were regular viewers who were thinking "Who the hell is she?" Then, when RuPaul asked her if she liked his dress - and she said it was beautiful or something like that - he said something like "We only have 2,000 left so you better place your order now!!" I interpreted it as him poking fun at her shopping channel background. She pretended to laugh but to me she looked kind of pissed. Why on earth she would do this show is beyond me. Either this is all she can get, or she's so desperate to be on TV again that she'll take anything that's offered. Whatever the reason, it seems like really bad judgment from the Duchess.

I saw this vignette on Facebook the other day and fell in love with it. A little container garden with an Alice in Wonderland theme - adorable! (By the way, @Friedbaloney - I love your toilet bowl planter idea!)

Deer - the bane of my existence! My yard is loaded with hostas and the deer love to munch on them. Last year we tried spraying hostas and other plants the deer like with Liquid Fence and it actually seems to work pretty well at keeping them from eating everything. The stuff smells awful, and you have to keep up with the spraying. Mr. Booney sprays once a week and, knock on wood, so far so good. We're away this week and he sprayed just before we left so hopefully we won't come home on Sunday to chewed up hostas!

They absolutely do hold up. I have two that are similar to the picture I posted earlier, and they're on either side of my front door. I must have bought them at least 15 years ago and they're still going strong. I have a cauldron style planter, a medium sized hay rack (which is my favorite - love!), and two wall racks that are attached to the deck and they have all lasted years. I've tried buying from other manufacturers, but they just don't last as well. I particularly like Deer Park Ironworks planters, but some of them have fallen apart after a few years of exposure to the elements. I have a wire wheelbarrow from them that I love, but we've had to reattach the front wheel a couple of times. I had a bicycle planter from them also that fell apart after a few years and really couldn't be put back together. Deer Park makes some smaller wire baskets that have held up well. I also had a couple of metal beverage tubs that I never used and I turned them into planters. They look really cute with flowers!

I'm with you on this, and it's Cottonelle brand for me. Fortunately BJ's sells it in huge 36 roll packages and the price, compared to the grocery store, is really good.

Wish I could take credit for that beautiful arrangement, @TexasTiffany, but the photo is from the Kinsman Company website. I own that particular planter and others like it, but I haven't put flowers in mine yet - will do so next week when I'm back from vacation. I just take a plastic hanging pot of impatiens or begonias (I cut off the hanger), and plop it in that planter and, voila - instant deck and yard decor! I actually used to pot up arrangements like that back in the day, but I've gotten lazy! Kinsman has a wide variety of ironwork planters like that. They're located in my general area and have a brick-and-mortar warehouse store where I've found some good deals on planters.

Same here - I have trouble finding the regular impatiens and I don't like the New Guinea variety. I have a variety of pretty ironwork planters lined with cocofiber, like this - I have all different kinds in this style - hay racks, wall planters, hanging baskets and free standing ones like this one. I buy already potted full-size impatiens and just plop them with their plastic pot into the planter. You can't see the pot because of the cocofiber liner, and it saves me a lot of time. I have a lot of planters on my deck, and I intersperse them in my garden too for "a pop of color." Because I have so much shade, I mainly grow things like hostas and hydrangeas so the impatiens brighten things up.

Thanks @kittygirl - I'll check it out. 7 weeks between coloring would be heaven!

My Facebook feed has ads that keep popping up for two home hair color kits - one is eSalon, and the other one is Madison Reed. Has anyone tried either of these? I get my hair colored in a salon and I'm getting tired of how much money I'm spending. My hair grows really fast, so I'm at the salon every 3 weeks getting a touch up. Letting my hair go gray (or in my case, white) is not an option I'm willing to consider. I like my hair blonde! I've gone lighter blonde to try to hide the white hair, but it's not working so well any more. Even though I don't necessarily want to deal with the mess of coloring my own hair, it would save a lot of money. Any recommendations or product reviews? Thanks in advance!

@zoemom, as other posters have said, try not to stress out - stress will make anyone feel overwhelmed and confused. A couple of tips... This idea may sound dumb, but think about getting a digital coin bank. Amazon has many of them, and some are under $10. The lid has a battery in it and a digital display, and as you push coins through the slot in the lid, it counts the money. You could put all your coins in the bank at the end of each day to get a total count, empty it, reset the counter to zero and do the same thing every day. I actually use of of these as a fun piggy bank, and I love it. Writing up procedures is a great idea because this will give you a cheat sheet to refer to as you perform the procedure. Some people like to write them up in the form of a checklist; this gives you the opportunity to check off each step as you complete it, if that would help you. Also, just the act of writing up the procedure may help you to remember it. As far as remembering people's faces/names, I know many people who have difficulty with this! A simple "I'm sorry but I'm not very good with names; please remind me of yours" - said with a smile - is good customer service in my book. Given your prior jobs, I'll bet you're great at customer service and helping others, so if you just do what you've done before in your "human side" jobs, you'll nail it. No one can predict what your bosses will do at the end of the month, but if they wanted to let you go, they could have done so at the end of the 60 days. Giving you feedback to help you improve is a good sign, I feel. It tells me they'd like to see you succeed, and so show them you're working to implement some of their suggestions. Just take it day by day.

I definitely want to see Guardians of the Galaxy 2. I saw the first one 3 times - loved it!

For the garden fans here, Mr. Booney and I visited the Elizabethan Gardens today on Roanoke Island in NC. It's small, but lovely. Mostly shade plants - lots of hostas, hydrangeas, and ferns. They also have a brick-walled rose garden and my favorite spot, a sunken garden with statues of Roman gods - pic below of the centerpiece statue -

Mine did too, @Coffeecup. The spot where they gave me the shot was red for a few days too.

I'm a little late to the party today, but it's not too late to wish everyone -

Makes me want to go back and look at some Bonanza episodes. Maybe I missed some "chemistry" between Ben and Hop Sing. ??

Lol - so true. Almost anyone would look good next to Larry and Curly.

That's hilarious, @CarpeDiem54! Does anyone remember Lorne's one hit wonder song, "Ringo" circa 1964? It was one of the best (worst?) examples of talk-singing. It was so bad it was good. I just saw Ann-Margaret in the movie "Going In Style" with Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman and Alan Atkin. She looks fabulous! Me too, although for me it's since I was 11. I fantasized about marrying him until Linda Eastman came along and dashed my dreams. ? I'm glad he's found happiness again after losing Linda and then his disastrous marriage to Heather Mills. I loved James Garner in the Rockford Files.

We have the Garden Railway here in the Philly area at the Morris Arboretum. It's a miniature railroad and all the buildings are replicas of historic buildings in and around Philadelphia - all are made with natural materials. For Christmas, they add seasonal decorations. It's one of my favorite Christmas attractions. I laughed when I saw "my stories." That's what my mother, sister and I always called them!

All those Bonanza boys were eye candy (well, maybe with the exception of Lorne Greene and Hop Sing). Pernell Roberts was the oldest son and he was another hunk. They raised some fine beefcake on that testosterone-fueled ranch! No, the original one - William Gray Espy. Better looking that the Hoff IMO -