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The life of a porn addicted housewife.

Tuesday, May 30, 2006

Losing Our History To Criminals 

As you know, Ap0k and I are trying to find the perfect house. We would like either an older Tudor or Victorian home. We have looked through many neighborhoods that are full or these types of homes, but unfortunately people are allowing them to rot away. It is a huge shame that these houses are going to be lost due to crime and neglect.

What were once beautiful stately homes are now falling apart at the seams. Many of these homes still have the original woodwork and original leaded stained glass windows.

Areas that were once thought of as the best neighborhoods are now full of criminal activity.

Take these houses for example:





Each of the houses shown above is a minimum of 75 years old. Each are also in areas that are so crime ridden no one wants to even drive through anymore.

This next house is absolutely beautiful. The problem is that THIS is the house that is next to the bridge people are using for an outhouse. This house is 126 years old, and has actually had many updates recently. The entire area is full of beautiful houses, but most of them are run down and/or are split up into multi-units.



The last house I want to show you breaks my heart. Take a look at the pictures of both the exterior and interior features:

















The above house is 98 years old and was part of the Frank Herschede estate. Frank Herschede owned a an award winning clock company amongst other things. The house also includes a 5 car garage and a carriage house with an apartment. By all rights you would think this house would be worth millions. Because of the direction the road this house is located on has taken the house is currently for sale for only $825,000. So far there are no takers and I highly doubt there will be. Anyone with that much money doesn’t want to live in that area anymore because it has declined so badly.

So what has happened to these areas that were once so sought after?

Times changed. It became more and more expensive to maintain these houses so people either moved away or divided the houses into apartments. It became fashionable to move to the suburbs. And of course at a certain point in time these houses were just seen as old. Of course the changes in local businesses also affected the areas. Neighborhood grocery stores closed due to the chain stores they could not fight and were replaced by gas stations and convenience stores. Local clothiers, Five and Dimes, etc closed because they could not compete with the malls. Today many of the buildings that once housed these stores sit empty and boarded up. When this happens the entire area begins to lose value and the prices of the homes drop.
Plus as everyone knows, when areas start to decline, the criminal element tends to move in.

There is a section of town here called “Over The Rhine.” At one time it was a very nice area full of grand homes and buildings. Today parts of it are so full of crime that the police have had to set up a special task force to try to clean it up. The National Historical Society recently added Over The Rhine to it’s list of the top endangered historical areas in the U.S.
Thankfully there are still some decent people living in that area that are trying to turn it around and restore it to what it once was.
What surprises me most about this area is that it is immediately adjacent to downtown. On one block you have beautiful buildings that house offices and restaurants, but on the next block there have been multiple shootings over the past few months. People are honestly afraid to drive down the roads. The police are trying to rid the area of drug dealers and prostitutes. There are homeless people everywhere you look. We drove through there the other day and I actually saw a guy peeing on a wall right alongside the road. Until people like this are totally removed from the area no one will want to move down there and restore the homes and buildings to their glory.

Moving the criminals out then poses another problem. Where do they go? From what I have heard in the news all that is really happening is that they are moving to another area of town and continuing on with their business. This is causing that area to now be worthless. The police are now starting to work on that area too thankfully. But in the end all that will happen is that the low-lifes will just move to another area and another and another until the police force is nothing more than task forces chasing them around the city.

People like Ap0k and I would give our right arms to have one of these houses, but how do you work up the nerve to buy one? People like us need to go in and buy up the houses and fix them back up. It is affordable and easy to do. The hard part is trying to figure out which area to do this in. What happens if I fork over all of my money to buy and repair one of these houses and the police don’t clean the area up? Personally, because some of these areas are so bad, I would not feel comfortable living there until it is cleaned up, if it ever is. I am just not that brave or stupid.

Something needs to be done about the criminals. Chasing them around the city is not the answer. They need to be locked up and locked up for good. They are destroying our history one neighborhood at a time. I don’t know about you, but think this is extremely sad.

Because the cost of construction has gotten so high, it is virtually impossible to replace these houses and buildings. These designs are part of our history and they are swiftly rotting away.

I wish I knew how to fix it.

Saturday, May 27, 2006

House Hunting Is A Pain In The Butt! 

Ap0k and I have been looking for a house to buy for a couple of weeks now. I have looked at so many it seems like they are all starting to look alike.
Our problem is that we want a house with character. I do NOT want a box! I’ve lived in a box my whole life and now I want peaks and angles. We are mainly looking at Tudor and Victorians, which around here are pretty much a dime a dozen. So what’s the problem you ask?

We have a set spending limit that we will not go over. We discussed it and agreed that being “house poor” is not an option with us. Our budget is fairly respectable I think, but we are having a hard time finding the right house.

We have looked at who knows how many houses within our price range, and while some of the houses have been perfect in every way themselves, the neighborhoods they are located in are not. We’ve also looked at a bunch in the perfect neighborhoods, but those houses are too expensive. ARGH!

If we scrimped we could buy one in the neighborhoods we want, but then we would have no money for anything else. That is what I meant when I said “house poor.” We have found a couple we could manage, but they have no garages and some don’t even have driveways. There is no way we can park his car on the street! Plus we don’t want to have just a house. We like to eat out, he likes to work on his car, and I like to shop now and then. If we go over our allotted budget we would have to give some or all of those things up. Having a nice house is great, but there is more to life than just that.

We looked at a Victorian today that was absolutely gorgeous and well within our budget. The problem with it was that it is located next to a big bridge and when we walked over to it you can tell that people are using it as an outhouse. I was devastated! I don’t know if it’s just people passing by, or if people are living under there. Either way, I can’t live next to it.

We have looked at many many Tudor style houses also. Sadly, so far the only ones we have found that we can afford are in the less than desirable areas of town.

Luckily we are in no rush to find a house. One of these days the perfect house in the perfect neighborhood will just spring up out of nowhere and we will jump on it.

In the meantime I will continue to search the MLS database everyday.

Wednesday, May 24, 2006

Bliss 

I am beside my myself.

Here it is 1:00PM and all my housework is done.
It is 73F outside and the weather is sheer perfection. The sun is shining as bright as it can and there isn't a cloud in the sky.

I have drug the big canvas chair out on the patio, I have a glass of crushed ice and my trusty laptop.

My flowers are blooming and the lady next door just mowed her lawn. The combined smell of the flowers and cut grass is almost overwhelming.

There are about 15 birds hopping around the back yard.

Could life get any better than this????

Sunday, May 21, 2006

Did We Move To A Zoo? 

I am beginning to think that we have moved to a zoo and someone forgot to tell us.

For one thing, I have never seen so many birds in all my life, birds of all colors and sizes.
Shocking reds, brilliant blues, chocolate browns, and satin blacks. They are, to put it plainly, just beautiful.

I have also never seen so many squirrels. They are everywhere. Big fat squirrels too, and all they do is eat eat eat.

Several times we have found rabbits in our yard, and there are raccoons all over in the mornings.

Just today I saw a little chipmunk standing in the middle of the road. He was the tiniest cutest little thing!

Now we come to the fun stuff! Remember though that we live in the middle of a giant city full of hundreds of thousands of people:

The day before yesterday Ap0k came home and told me that he had been out driving in one of the company trucks and a deer almost jumped off a wall onto his truck. A deer??? In the middle of the city??? Of course I believed him, but I will admit that I found that awfully odd. Later that night we were driving around looking at houses and as we passed on house Ap0k slammed on the brakes and told me to look. There were TWO deer standing in a yard. This neighborhood is abut 80 years old and it’s right smack in the middle of the city. Where on earth did deer come from? It’s not like they are being pushed out of any areas because there is no construction going on anywhere. I swear this is the least active construction area in the country. So where on earth are deer coming from? Someone that works for Ap0k said that they saw 3 deer right outside of the warehouse the night. There are deer all over the place. It makes no sense to me at all.

Today we were again driving around looking at houses and we passed a small pond that was just off the road. In between the pond and the road there sat a huge beaver. A beaver??? In the middle of the city??? This was the first time I had ever seen a wild beaver and I will say that I was completely shocked.

Florida has snakes, lizards, brown birds, seagulls and alligators. That’s about it. Seeing all these animals, especially right in the middle of a huge city, is completely fascinating to me.

Deer and beavers in the middle of the city……..who would have thought???

Saturday, May 20, 2006

TCRF and MM Are Having Problems 

Just letting everyone know that I am aware of the problems at TCRF and Moviemart.
Trader and I both have sent mails to the people who can fix it. Hopefully one of these days they will see the mails!
I think the server needs rebooted.
Keep your fingers crossed!!!!!

Thursday, May 18, 2006

What Makes You Smile? 

For some reason new flowers make me smile from ear to ear.

Here are my roses. I have never had roses before in my life, so when these came up in the back yard I almost hurt myself with glee. I never thought they would actually bloom, but as you can see they really are doing pretty well.





These flowers are actually on a bush. Because I have no idea what the bush is I call it the snow bush. The flowers are actually very tiny and it really does look like snow on the branches.


This one is for my little sister, the ladybug fanatic. It's not the greatest picture, but trying to catch a pic of a bug when it's on a branch blowing in the wind is not the easiest thing in the world to do.

Sunday, May 14, 2006

Drama At The Waffle House 

Ap0k and I went to Waffle House at 5:30AM Saturday morning. For some reason nothing in town stays open all night or opens early, so when you are hungry in middle of the night (or early morning), Waffle House it is.
Apparently the 3rd shift staff did not complete all of their scheduled cleaning tasks before they left because the 1st shift staff was pretty annoyed about it. Of course the restaurant has to be cleaned so the 1st shift staff was doing it all. The two guys working there weren’t complaining much, but the two girls were fussing pretty good.
One of the girls finally took it upon herself to complain to the manager, which of course I think was the right thing to do. Unfortunately instead of going about it the right way she was loud and kind of obnoxious about it. When the manager tried to explain to her that while he would deal with the 3rd shift later, they still had to clean everything up at that time. Instead of letting it drop the girl just kept getting louder and more belligerent.
Now if you haven’t actually eaten at a Waffle House before, I know you had to have at least seen them. They are tiny little places. So of course we, and all of the other customers, could every word of the argument going on. By now everyone in the restaurant, employees and customers were completely silent. Not a peep from anyone. Total silence except for the waitress because by now the manager was being very quiet. All of a sudden she came storming out of the back crying saying that she had been fired. Still not a peep from anyone else in the whole place. She stomped around a bit gathering up her stuff and saying things like “They’ll have a hard time replacing me.” Finally the other girl who works there asked her if she was going to be ok, but crying girl just mumbled something and went outside.
The customers started talking again then, but the rest of the staff just went about their duties like little ants. They wanted no part in any of it!
When we had finished eating and went outside to leave, the girl was still sitting outside on a curb crying like mad.

I totally understand her point of view. She was right that it wasn’t fair that the 1st shift had to do the 3rd shift’s duties. Sadly she went about it totally unprofessionally and got fired. I felt bad for her, but the manager only did what he had to do.

Ahhhhh……drama!

Thursday, May 11, 2006

Long Overdue Update 

If you look over to the left you will see that I have updated all of my favorites.
There are new blogs, forums, music sites, and oddball sites.
I hope you find something that you like!

Remember, if you want me to add your link, just shoot me an email with your site info and I will check it out.

Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Senze Magazine - Issue #5 



Issue #5 of Senze Magazine is out!

This issue features:

*A profile on Nelly Recchia, a Hollywood make-up artist and body painter. There are several pictures featuring her work and I find all of the to be completely stunning.

*The Fashion section is all about black and red latex whith photos taken by Stellan Stebe.

*Annelie and Anton are musician and fetish wear designers. There is a nice interview with both of them.

*Eva Bende is a Hungarian artstistic clothing designer who's designs are based on nature. There is a very interesting article about her along with some samples of her work. The dress on page 72 is almost shockingly beautiful.

*Page 81 is a small featurette from Kija explaining how she became a fetish model. Leave it to Stellan Stebe to find us the most beuatiful girls around.

*Pay special attention to the ten page spread featuring the photography work of Nicola Ranaldi. These pictures are fantastic!

*This issue's Book Section contains a review of the photography book "Digital Diaries" by Natacha Merritt.

All in all this issue is another top-notch effort from the whole Senze staff!

Monday, May 08, 2006

Not A Care In The World 

Sunday, May 07, 2006

Lenore 




A dirge for her, the doubly dead.
In that she died so young.

"Lenore" - Edgar Allen Poe


Roman Dirge has drawn and written some of the best comics around. These include "Haunted Masion" and "Sloth". but without a doubt my favorite is the series titled "Lenore: The Cute Little Dead Girl."
The Lenore series follows the adventures of, just as the title says, a pretty little dead girl and her friends. These comics are only for people like me who have a completely warped sense of humor. Lenore is stalked by Mr. Gosh, who wants to marry her. She drags around her cat, also dead. She even has a friend named Ragamuffin, a vampire trapped in a ragdoll's body for all eternity.

If you are interested in checking out some of the Lenore info you can go to the following sites.

Roman Dirge's official site:
http://www.spookyland.com

Lenore's Wikipedia Page. Contains info on all of the characters:
http://www.answers.com/topic/lenore-the-cute-little-dead-girl

This site has over 20 short Lenore cartoons in Flash animation:
http://www.nightrose.com/lenore.htm
My favorite is "Little Bunny Foo-Foo". The moral is hysterical.

I have begun collecting Lenore items too. So far I have the set of PVC characters:



I also have a keychain. A couple of years ago I bought my daughter the stuffed doll. I wish I had bought myself one too! If anyone is looking to get me a gift, I want the doll!!!! Of course there are other Lenore doo-dads I want to get my hands on too. Bit by bit I will get them.

Tuesday, May 02, 2006

No More Taquitos Before Bed! 

Sometimes eating odd food really CAN affect your dreams!
Take last night for example. I had the great idea that eating 5 taquitos and a Godiva truffle at 3:00AM would be a great idea. Yeah, right.

AMERICAN IDOL WANNABE:

Dream number one had me actually WINNING American Idol. Yes, I know I can not sing a note, but even in the dream that did not matter. Yes, I know that I am 40 years old and way over the age limit, but for some reason that worked in my favor.
I went to the auditions and Simon raved over the fact that I was older. He said that America is tired of all the cookie cutter young people. They also called my voice “unique.”
Jump to the voting episodes of the show. Amazingly each week I was getting more votes than anyone else by a landslide. All of the forums were raving about how new and different I was.
In the final show I was up against a Carrie Underwood type clone and we had to sing “Mountains” by Prince. The clone had never even heard the song and she butchered it up completely, but I was able to knock the song out perfectly. The audience gave me a standing ovation and on the next nights show I was named the newest Idol.
Now how silly is that?

Break to get out of bed to use the bathroom

NIGHTMARE:

Dream number two was not all light and happy; in fact it upset me really badly. It made absolutely no sense at all, yet made all the sense in the world at the time.
Ap0k had to drive to Indianapolis (which is true, he’s there now) and I told him to call me when he got there. He, of course, forgot (which is also true, he was supposed to call and hasn’t) so I was left wondering if he made it ok. Because it was (and is) a business event I was (and can’t) unable to call him to check.
After a few hours I became worried (which I’m not because he always forgets to call me) so I decided to go look for him. Two guys from my IRC chat, Napier and Nautley, decided they were going to come too because it was unsafe for me to go alone. Of course in real life neither one of them lives anywhere near me and the whole scenario is totally unfeasible. For some reason all three of us took our own trucks and traveled in a line down the interstate. Once we left Ohio and made it into Indiana the scenery changed dramatically, which is silly as both states actually look alike. The area became very mountainous and it was really really dark and stormy. About an hour into our drive we went over a big bridge. When you went over it you actually lost traction with the ground and fell about 50’ straight down. Luckily we all landed safely but somehow we had become hopelessly lost. We found a little town and went into a small restaurant. My little sister was there and for some never explained reason she was dressed as a story book princess. She had on the stereotypical princess dress and pointy hat and it was all in the prettiest shade of purple. Everyone else in the restaurant was dressed equally as odd and we couldn’t figure out why. In fact they looked at the three of us like WE were crazy. We sat down to eat and these odd people kept coming up to our table to sit with us. We were really getting freaked out because the people were all talking oddly about some really screwy things.
By now it was storming horribly outside, but we felt that we had to leave the place or something bad was going to happen. When we got out to the parking lot a police officer came up and started yelling at us that we had not left the waitress a tip. We tried to explain that we had, but he was getting angrier and angrier by the second until he took out his nightstick and started swinging it at all of us. I managed to get into my truck and got it started and the other two jumped in with me and we took off. The police officer jumped in his car and started following us down the road. It was so dark and stormy that I was having a really hard time seeing where I was going and somehow I drove right off the side of a mountain and we were falling falling falling……..
Then I woke up, but I was really still dreaming. I was back in my living room lying on the couch and Ap0k said “Thank goodness you are alright!” I tried to ask him what had happened, but then I actually DID wake up.

So, even though Ap0k really did forget to call me, I am NOT going to go looking for him!!! And I really need to stop eating crap before I go to bed!!!

I think I will just go to the bank and then go try to find my Mom a Mother’s Day present instead. Hopefully that will knock that last dream out of my head.