Long Dry Spell/Recycling hazardous waste/Large Furniture Pickup and Tax Deduction

WEATHER
We are finished with the Atlantic basin hurricane season as of November 30th. So, until June 1, 2011, the start of the next hurricane season, this section will just be about non-tropical cyclone weather.

The US weather pattern is stuck in a rut with a persistent cold trough over the northeastern US and a part of a smaller trough over the eastern US. This also means that the wet weather will be riding over northern California and then up into the Rockies and through the Midwest and down to the Tennessee Valley and into the eastern seaboard for the next week of so. Just talked to my brother last night. He and his wife Wanda are back up at Mayo doing a followup to her thyroid removal for cancer. He said it was snowing like crazy and it was that really neat dry, powdery snow. Mayo Clinic is in Minnesota. Btw, Wanda is doing very well but is very tired as not being allowed to take hormones right now as part of the treatment. Please keep them in your prayers.

Anyway, it will be very cold over the western Great Lakes states and northeast on Sunday with highs in the teens and 30s. There will be snow over parts of the Great Lakes states. Meanwhile, dry and pleasant across the southwest and southern plains with highs in the 50s to 70s.

Houston, next week will be on the cool side with Sunday through Tuesday highs only in the 50s and lows in the 30s...bundle up Sunday as it will be breezy. Don't look for rain for at least 9 days...very dry pattern in place.


SPANISH WORD OF THE DAY
Let's do window blinds or persianas de la ventana, pronounced pair-see-ah-NAHS day lah vehn-TAH-na. Having a problem with your persianas de la ventana. Check the AND MORE section for the name of an excellent repair person.

Spoke to our CD production guy and he said they are printing the graphic inserts for the front covers of our new Volume 3 DVD and soon to be released music review CD. Very soon, we will have 1000 copies of our new Volume 3 DVD and Music CD for Volumes 1, 2 and 3. In the meantime, you can find my award winning education series, Let's Learn Spanish with Frank & Paco, Volumes 1 and 2, on the shelf (in the education section) at Barnes & Noble stores or you can order them from http://www.frankandpaco.com, http://www.amazon.com, http://www.bn.com, http://www.bestbuy.com, or http://www.ebay.com/. Our ESL (English as a Second Language) version can be found at http://www.frankypaco.com. P.S. THEY MAKE TERRIFIC GIFTS!!!

AND MORE
New Poll
My poll on method for gift shopping is closed. 100% of respondents said they are doing most of their shopping by Internet. No one said they were doing most of their shopping in person at stores, making homemade, by catalog or not giving gifts. Only one answer was allowed. Thanks to all who participated.

My new poll is about how you send Christmas or New Year's greetings--or do you do this at all? Only one answer is allowed. Thanks in advance for participating.

How to Get Window Blind Strings Repaired
We have lovely wide Levolor window blinds in our home. The problem is that they are fairly heavy and occasionally a string (used to adjust the blinds) breaks. It took me a while to find someone who wanted to work such a small job as fixing a broken string or pulley, but I have a great guy for this. He just fixed up two of our windows. His name is Larry Thomas and he is the owner of City Blind Repair 713-664-0444. Give him a call and get those windows working again!

Get rid of that heavy furniture and get a nice tax deduction
Gordy and I just got rid of a bunch of old furniture. One was a sectional sofa with sleeper sofa on one side. We didn't want to pay to have these carted off and we didn't have a truck we could use to move them. So, I contacted The Salvation Army at 713-869-3551. They will schedule large furniture pickups. If you call, make sure you tell them everything you want picked up. And don't expect to get any computer desks picked up. Apparently, they have had trouble getting rid of those and they end up costing them money to unload. You can also schedule the pickup online by emailing SAtruck.org. In Houston, the furniture is taken to a huge warehouse. There are 20 trucks running every day and they fill them up about twice a day. The proceeds go to Adult Rehabilitation Centers Comman. According to long time employee, David, the books are zeroed out each month. Any profit left over is given to the other efforts of the Salvation Army such as disaster relief.

Side note on the huge computer desk I no longer needed. We put it out with the garbage the night before the weekly large item garbage pickup and within 10 minutes, someone had taken it away. Glad someone found it useful!

Properly dispose of Hazardous Waste
While cleaning out junk in my home, I came across 5 portable DVD player batteries and an empty propane can. All said to dispose of properly and NOT put in the trash. Well Sugar Land and Missouri City had no place for dropping off this kind of waste. So I went to the City of Houston web site and they have 2 hazardous waste disposal centers. One is on the north side and one is at Highway 90 and Post Oak. That location takes waste from 9 am to 3 pm on Tuesday and Wednesday and they also have some Friday hours. It is super easy...you just drive through this long open warehouse. You stop at a designated point and they open your trunk and take the bad stuff away for proper disposal. They also take leftover paint. Certain days of the month they give the public the opportunity to take away any unused paint for personal use.

Here's to getting all those deductions by year end and reusing through recycling!

Cecilia Sinclair
Wonder Weather Woman