Boy, I've been thinking about this stuff recently myself. I just turned 50 this yr, and my husband will be 52 in January. We don't really make much money, but it's enough to get by with and still afford the multitudes of roses that I don't really need, plus his tinkering around with cars and stuff. I work in retail, so don't earn alot, but I get such a great discount that it's worth staying, plus the hours are easy. I'm just not feeling that well physically any more. The floors at work are concrete and I have all sorts of foot, back and hip pains, plus increasingly worse varicose veins. But at my age, what am I going to find that pays more than minimum wage? My poor husband is uneducated, altho not totally illiterate, and has dyslexia (which contributed to his lack of education). He managed to handle 10 yrs in the Navy, but was "let go" back at the end of the 80's when they started cutting back on the military and weeded out those who were not the "cream of the crop." We had the two boys and came home to be close to family. He had a hard time getting a decent job. But he ended up becoming a garbage man. Not the best job in the world, that's for sure, but it pays decently and we have medical, dental, optical, 401k. He's been doing that for going on 18 yrs now, and is sooo sick of it, he actually makes himself ill nearly every morning before leaving for work. He hates the job so much he coughs himself to the point of often throwing up. I lie in bed hearing him and want to cry. I feel horrible that he hates it so much. I just want to find a way to let him be able to quit. But we have a mortgage and a few bills too many for either of us to be able to quit working for at least 10-15 yrs. I know he's not going to be able to do this that many more yrs. He's in a deep depression. He comes home and does nothing but lie on the couch and watch tv and sleep. He even quit drinking beer because he feels so lousy. I recently made a decision tho. I told him if he can stick it out about 6 more yrs, I think he will be able to quit. His parents both died in the last 4-5 yrs, and his 4 sisters and he decided to sell the family home next summer. The house is practically a tear-down, but it's on a beautiful canyon-view lot, that's worth more than the house. So I figure once they sell the property, we'll get a decent chunk. Then, my dad passed away in Feb at 93, and my mom just turned 89. She's in somewhat ill health, and I know she won't be around forever. I know it's awful to think about losing her, but we all know it's an inevitability. If she doesn't end up with some catastophic illness that wipes out their money, I will stand to inherit a pretty good amount. Then, we can pay off the house. If this happens within the next couple of yrs, I told him if he can handle working about 4-5 yrs beyond that, we'll save up his income and then he can quit early and we can live on what we've saved up until he's eligible to collect his 401k and then SS. So, that's our tentative plan. But things change. As for winning the lottery... you can't win if you don't play. I keep telling our younger son, who has OCD, to try and come up with the winning numbers so we can all live happily ever after. He just laffs.

I think the first thing I would have done was go to system restore and done a quick restore to the day before when all was well. You could still do that actually and that would restore the settings to the correct ones. If it happens again do that first just select a time/date from a day just prior when everything was ok. Go to Start Select All Programs Select Accessories Select System Tools Select System Restore here is a good site with info on system restore in Vista http://www.5starsupport.com/faq/vista-system-restore.htm I am wondering if this somehow could have had something to do with the original dates for daylight savings time? It was originally set to occur Sunday April 6th but this year of course it was changed. There was a patch put out through windows updated to fix this issue. It just seems strange it happened so close to that date. Do you have all your current windows updates done?

a good answer would require a crystal ball. I guess my first question would be "are you happy living in an apartment?" and "what would be different?" You only mention the negatives so my thought is that you don't want to do this and so you shouldn't. On the other hand I can't think of anyone who was sorry they made the move to buy a house. With interest rates so favorable I would think you could do quite well for just the price of renting. I have known quite a number of people who bought mobile homes or condos who were sorry because they were so hard to get out from under, but not one who was sorry they bought a stick built single home.

This level of tackiness makes me cringe. If they can't afford more paid ground workers, they might try putting out a call for volunteers, or apprentices who would work for less pay and the experience, or even for the joy of it. There may be apartment dwellers nearby who would like to get their hands in the dirt. High schoolers. A program developed for middle schoolers who are at loose ends after school. A local corrections center program. Residents of a retirement complex. Almost anyone can pull weeds. It sounds like they're spending way too much time hand watering. The initial cost for a drip irrigation system with a timer would be a good investment. It might even be donated if the need is made known. A more creative and resourceful head grounds keeper might be the solution.