New Jersey Baby Boomer

Just down the road from me a few houses, a former neighbor of mine went through an experience that is becoming more and more common, and more and more public…identity theft. It had such an impact on her that she was unable to access her bank accounts, or use credit cards until matters were cleared up, and that doesn’t happen overnight. Ultimately, it upset the finances so much, that she never quite got back on her feet, at least in our neighborhood…and eventually sold her home and moved out of the area. While not everyone may experience such a dramatic affect, this is something we should be taking seriously.

Thankfully, we have many things available to us to protect us from these predators, and whether we take advantage of them or not is determined by how seriously we take the problem. I have been doing some things, like shredding or burning (in our woodstove) papers with personal info on them, being careful about giving out my social security number, and using care when I make a Credit Card Payment online.

People who research identity theft that takes place when you make a purchase online are finding that often employees at the place where you shop online are the guilty parties in stealing identity. This means you need some form of protection when you shop online, something to think seriously about as we approach the holiday season (I do all my Christmas shopping online!).

I visited a very helpful site today, you can get to it through the earlier “live link”, the site is called Shop Shield®, and offers protection by completely hiding your identity when you make a purchase with your credit card online. Your name, address, phone number, credit card numbers, passwords and email addresses are protected through their unique way of replacing that info with anonymous info. Your personal information is never made available to the website where you are shopping.

I’d suggest you visit the site to find out how this works. A few more thoughts:

- Service is FREE when you pay with a checking account.
- Secure Site Registration included with each transaction.
- Shop Shield® is Guaranteed 100% Secure!

The fall colors are beautiful right now…but many were surprised by the snow yesterday, that continues to fall very lightly this morning. Acorns and the clumps of wet snow falling from the leaves onto our cabin-home roof were an odd mix of sounds to listen to throughout the evening last night.

But it was enough to take me outside with my camera to try and capture a few pictures. I’m not really ready for snow, but better to enjoy it a bit than complain.

Happy fall? winter? to you.

It was such a treat to attend the very first air show not far from our home at the Greenwood Lake Airport here in my home town, West Milford, New Jersey.  I have always loved air shows…we’ve traveled miles and stayed over night in hotels to visit some, so having one so close by was an extra blessing. 

We were there on Saturday, September 26, 2009, and probably the best day as it rained and was very overcast on Sunday.  This is an airport that we brought our children to when they were young to watch the small planes take off.  Now they are adults…it’s also a place we occasionally visit for a weekend lunch at their restaurant.  Always so quiet and peaceful, nestled in an area surrounded by trees, but last Saturday, the crowds were amazing to see.  Parking was up in the parking lot for the old Jungle Habitat, and was handled with great efficiency by our local police dept. and what I believe were members of a unit of the air national guard…correct me in comment if you happen to stop by and read this and I’m wrong.

I have always loved planes, this going back I’m sure to having a grandfather who was a Navy man and a retired US Air Force Captain.  Then there was my own Dad who was an electrical engineer all of his working years in the aeronautics division of a large company…designing parts for planes, including an invention or two, as well as designing parts for the space program when that became important to our Nation.  So I guess you could say it’s in my blood.  The funny part is that I prefer my feet to be on the ground, not in a plane…but there’s no greater sound to me than the rush of a powerful military jet flying low overhead, and nothing more fun than watching extremely skilled pilots make smaller sized planes do things I never imagined possible. 

I’m including a couple pictures here, and plan to devote some more time, pictures and detail to the air show through another venue soon, I’ll link to it here when it’s done.  You’ll also want to visit http://www.greenwoodlakeairshow.com - I hope this is the first of what will become an annual event.

Just noticed that my son added some pictures to his facebook page, stop by and take a look, he’s a better photographer than I am.

ACORN has made news in a big way with the pimp and prostitute videos in the past few weeks thanks to Glenn Beck and FoxNews Channel, not to mention the courage of James O’Keefe acting as a pimp (a New Jersey native…grew up in the town next to where my mother lives now) and Hannah Giles playing the role of a prostitute looking for help to open up a brothel, complete with girls brought in through the sex trade.

Forgive me, this isn’t my typical nice post, I’m a little steamed at this. I know just mentioning Glenn Beck’s name and FoxNews in one sentence probably has raised the blood pressure of a few of you, but many are watching according to the ratings…..and talk about raised blood pressure, if you haven’t seen the videos, I hope your’s will be too after viewing them…and not because of pretty Hannah who Glenn Beck suggested be careful and “cover up”.  Don’t be fooled by Acorn’s claims that these are just a few problem people, there are at least 5 videos that I’ve seen in various locations throughout the country, all similar, some more shocking than others.

After watching the videos in stunned disbelief, I wondered how many ACORN community organizations were here in New Jersey.  I did a search, and as you would be inclined to expect, most are located in our cities, Jersey City, Newark, Paterson, and Trenton.  I’m not going to include links to these organizations until I know that they are worthy…in fact I removed a most of a post I had done a few months ago because of their ties to the organization. 

I’m going to be interested in seeing how the investigation they are starting is going to change things, if at all, and watching the shuffle in Washington DC as they try to distance themselves from the organization that President Obama claimed would play a role in his being elected to the Presidency. 

Just in case you watch the wrong news stations, thought maybe I’d include a video or two for you so you can see what’s been going on, and lets hope that exposing this will lead to a better ACORN, and if it can’t get better, no ACORN at all.  Where did they get these people?  Don’t they have a screening process when they hire?  Here’s just a couple parts of one video session in Brooklyn, New York:

And here’s the one from the other side of the Country, in San Bernadino, oh there’s more, but this is enough for now…I’m really sorry to clutter up this blog with such negative stuff, but it’s important, and since the film maker is from New Jersey, belongs:

(acorn image from acorn.org)

This past weekend my husband and I enjoyed the simple pleasure of getting in the car and just driving, and enjoying one another’s company. 

As you know, New Jersey is called “the Garden State” and a place where there is a lot of farming.  You may not know that if you have never been here and rely on what you see in movies, or if you lump New Jersey together with New York City as many do who are from other parts of the country. 

In fact, New York City isn’t all there is to New York either.  We are very close to the state line which takes you into “Upstate” New York, the term we use for the more rural and beautiful parts of the State. 

This past weekend our travels took us into Pine Island, the black earth region in Orange County, NY, the soil is so very rich and beautiful, and root crops, especially onions, were being harvested as we drove through.  We stopped to buy some local delicious produce, all grown in this rich soil.

And what does all of this have to do with free business cards? I was introduced to a pretty site that talks about free not really being entirely free…but what really caught my eye was the beautiful business cards, and because we had just been visiting these farming communities, was drawn to look at the “farming and agriculture” cards, there were hundreds of beautiful choices. In fact there are many, many categories of cards to choose from no matter what your profession. You really must stop by and take a look for yourself. I have bookmarked this site for future reference, there’s so much to look at, you can custom make cards at the site as well.

Here is a picture from Pine Island, “donamaree” of Webshots gets credit for this lovely photo. Notice how black the earth is between the crop rows.

Over a year ago I did a post about Les Paul and a friend of ours in NJ who often shared stories of the days when he worked alongside Les Paul.  Les Paul got his start here in the Garden State, and passed away today in a NY hospital not so very far away, White Plains Hospital, surrounded by family and friends.

Always sorry to hear about the loss of someone great, and what a long and full life he lived.  It’s my understanding that he passed from complications due to Pneumonia.  

Our best wishes to the family. 

Here is a link to the post in case you’d like to visit - NJ Celebrities: Les Paul and Mary Ford

8/15 - Thought I’d edit in a video for you, enjoy!