I was in a water phase for a while, now I seem to be in a light hair against a darker background phase. This is a pain to do, and I am tempted to get out the gouache or the Prismacolors and touch up the hair, but I am being a stubborn watercolor purist and haven't yet.
We had a dusting of snow last night, but the sun was out most of the day. Even with the sun it is super cold, with the high for the next few days in the 20s. Once it is in the 20s it is just plain cold and any lower temperatures are still just plain cold. Tonight's estimated low is 11, tomorrow's is 5. The last heating (gas) bill that covered the artic blast we had around Thanksgiving was almost $60. I figure that is a high as it will go.
I spent today trying to finish half-done things. I went to Jiffy Lube because I needed an Idaho emissions test by tomorrow. They exempted my car from the test, but I got an oil change I needed anyway. I figured out what that temperature warning light in my car really means. It means that your gas mileage is about to suck. Because the battery does not work well in freezing weather and I am always running the heater, my car uses the gas part of the engine most of the time. My gas mileage went from an average of 50 MPG to 30 MPG. Normally with city driving my car mostly uses only the electric part of the engine, not true when it is cold, since all I have been doing is city driving and I am now getting 30 MPG. Not like 30 MPG is bad, and I am not driving much anyway.
I finally sent an artist statement and some samples to the Eagle gallery, so they can add me to the gallery website. I put it off, because I just hate writing artist's statements (also known as BIOs.)
I finally balanced the checkbook. The last few months I have been putting this off because I don't like seeing my money disappear. I forgot that I found a mistake on my November statement and was so upset with myself that I did not check it earlier that I set it down and didn't finish balancing my account. I appear to have been scammed. Anyone get that email about the cash back scam? The email includes this happening at WalMart, but it happened to me at Staples. I sent Staples an email about it today, mostly just to let them know, because I figure there is nothing they can do about it now.
The way I was scammed at Staples had a bit of a different spin on it. I bought something and used my debit card and wanted $20 cash back. The cashier said my debit did not go through and she had to put it through as a credit without the cash back. I left without the $20 and without checking my receipt. The $20 was included on the debit from my bank account when I checked my statement, so I went back and looked at the receipt and it reflected the transaction as a debit and included the $20 I never received. My mistake. I am now checking receipts or paying cash. I'm lucky that was only a $20 lesson. The email version is a bit different, I must have confused things by really trying to get cash back, but here is the WalMart version:
"It happened at Wal-Mart (Supercenter Store #1279,
10411 N Freeway 45, Houston , TX 77037 a month ago.
I bought a bunch of stuff, over $150, & I glanced at my receipt as the cashier
was handing me the bags. I saw a cash-back of $40. I told her I didn't request a cash back & to delete it.
She said I'd have to take the $40 because she couldn't delete it. I told her to call a supervisor.
Supervisor came & said I'd have to take it! I said NO! Taking the $40 would be a cash advance against my Discover & I wasn't paying interest on a cash advance!!!!! If they couldn't delete it then they would have to delete the whole order.
So the supervisor had the cashier delete the whole order & re-scan everything!
The second time I looked at the electronic pad before I signed & a cash-back
of $20 popped up. At that point I told the cashier & she deleted it. The total came out right. The cashier agreed that the electronic pad must be defective.
(yeah, right!)
Obviously the cashier knew the electronic pad wasn't defective because she NEVER
offered me the $40 at the beginning.
Can you imagine how many people went through before me & at the end of her shift
how much money she pocketed?
Just to alert everyone. My coworker went to Milford, DE Wal-Mart last week. She had her items rung up by the cashier. The cashier hurried her along and didn't give her a receipt.
She asked the cashier for a receipt and the cashier was annoyed and gave it to her.
My coworker didn't look at her receipt until later that night. The receipt showed that she asked for $20 cash back. SHE DID NOT ASK FOR CASH BACK!
My coworker called Wal-Mart who investigated but could not see the cashier pocket the money. She then called her niece who works for the bank and her niece told her this.
This is a new scam going on. The cashier will key in that you asked for cash back
and then hand it to her friend who is the next person in line."
I cleaned my studio, my brushes, and my palette to get ready to paint the next painting and compiled all the miscellaneous partial to-do lists into one list. I still have a pile of reading, including most of last Sunday's newspaper and some stuff about network marketing, but mostly I have finished those loose ends I do not want to take into next year. Tomorrow I am writing that 2010 inventory and it should be fun, since it was a learning, growing, and an adventurous year.
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