Imagine my surprise when I see the Woot off continues today! See yesterday’s post for more info.

Enjoy!
Tony

There is another Woot Off today.

If you are unfamiliar, usually Woot.com has “one day one deal” but on Woot offs they sell a bunch of different things, moving to the next when the current one sells out. Good deals go quick so register and log in. That way it just takes a click if you see something you like.

Peace,
Tony

I’ve written about www.Woot.com before and their woot offs, today is a Kids.woot woot off. Watch often to see if there is something you’d like. I’ve bought from both woot and kids.woot before.

Tony

I’m late to to the show on this one, but Maclaren has recalled all of its strollers due to an unfortunate side effect of kids loosing fingertips.

From U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commision

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, in cooperation with the firm named below, today announced a voluntary recall of the following consumer product. Consumers should stop using recalled products immediately unless otherwise instructed.
Name of Product: Maclaren Strollers

Units: About one million

Distributor: Maclaren USA, Inc., of South Norwalk, Conn.

Hazard: The stroller’s hinge mechanism poses a fingertip amputation and laceration hazard to the child when the consumer is unfolding/opening the stroller.

Incidents/Injuries: The firm has received 15 reports of children placing their finger in the stroller’s hinge mechanism, resulting in 12 reports of fingertip amputations in the United States.

Description: This recall involves all Maclaren single and double umbrella strollers. The word “Maclaren” is printed on the stroller. The affected models included Volo, Triumph, Quest Sport, Quest Mod, Techno XT, TechnoXLR, Twin Triumph, Twin Techno and Easy Traveller.

If you own one of these, stop using it immediately!!

Peace,
Tony

New in the category of “Bad Dad” is a man from Minneapolis who was beating his son so terribly the son tried to hide in the oven. When his dad found him there, he turned the oven on to get him out.

From the Minneapolis Star Tribune:

The charges allege that William T. Hurley turned on the oven with his 10-year-old inside. The boy climbed out after it began to get warm, the complaint said.

The allegations of beating are bad enough that I have no desire to repeat them here. In fact I was hesitant on even using this one as the first in the “Bad Dad” because this guy deserves a much worse title. Something that really bothered me in the story was the mother’s role in why the kid tried hiding in the oven:

The boy ran out of the apartment screaming for help, but his mother grabbed him and brought him back in,

I’m trying to understand the reasoning behind this and am coming up short.

This family has my prayers, I hope the boy recovers safely. I sincerely hope the father enjoys a long stay in prison.

Peace,
Tony

Folks, I’ve taken it upon myself to add a new category within Dad on a Dime. Bad Dad will be used to comment on stories from the news that demonstrate fathers being less than ideal to their children. I’m hoping to include the spectrum of stories from light hearted to “that person should be removed from the gene pool, I hope his kids do better…”

Frankly, I’m not sure how long I can keep this one going, because the two stories in the press locally make a sad commentary already.

Sit tight, we’ll see how this one goes!

Peace,
Tony

I have been diligently saving my pennies and dimes for a while to buy a laptop computer for our secondary computing. When my wife is working from home and needs the main computer, it is off limits to the rest of the family and a laptop would be nice for me to get my surf craves in!

My daughter and I walked through the local Best Buy to scope out my options. The last time I was in there they had some clearance laptops that would work just fine and they were in the price range that I wanted to spend.

No such luck this time on the clearance, but it turns out they did have a couple new options right at the price point limit. So I came back home and made some calls (thanks bro) and researched a little online and decided on the one I wanted.

After picking up my oldest from school we drove on over and I said “I want that one!”.

“Awesome, man, but I can’t sell it to you until tomorrow.”

?!?!?!? huh?!?!?

Something to do with the preloaded operating system not being released or licensed until tomorrow. It sounded like a crock of beans to me, but whatever, I’ve got more time than anything else, and it is a good deal.

So it is back to the store tomorrow to pick up my new laptop and give it a whirl. What a let down though. I wonder how many other folks they turned away. Why the heck do they have a product on the shelf that they can’t sell until tomorrow?

Dumb store.

Peace,
Tony

The girls found some Halloween cookie cutters in the dollar section of the local Target a week ago. They have been bugging me and pestering me to make cookies with them since we got them. Since they are off from school for a long five day weekend and the other plans for today fell through, we figured “sure” lets make cookies.

“Give me a couple minutes to find a decent recipe.” I need to find recipes that are easily adjustable to our particular allergies.

“Whoops, looks like we have to run to the store kids, there isn’t enough soy margarine thawed and we’re almost out of flour.”

We’re back from the store in time to cut in the margarine and add the rest of the ingredients. “Well, would you look at that! It says the dough has to cool for an hour in the fridge, and oh my goodness! It’s nap time!”

How convenient, no?

There has got to be an award for stretching a 40 minute recipe into five hours!

Peace,
Tony

Eight years ago today we said our vows. They must have been great because I can’t even remember how many years our anniversary fell on a Friday! At least once, I suppose.

Happy Anniversary hon!

Hmm, I wonder if you will read this today? Here is a frugal tip for folks. When shopping for a gift, make sure to check out the clearance sections too. There is always something to be found. No more hints!

For two and a half years I’ve been using a square of plywood on the metal cabinet that used to hold my radial arm saw as a work bench. It was always frustrating trying to clear enough space to lay out a project, or cut a board with the miter saw.

I had been meaning to put a loft in my shed to move some of the boxes out of our house, stuff that we don’t use often but don’t want to get rid of. Initially I was planning on using 2×4’s, so I picked up 10 or so. After consulting with my father in law, I went with 12′ 2×6’s instead. (Always take the advice of engineers, particularly structural engineers.)

Rather than go through the hassle of returning the 2×4’s, I just left them leaning in the shed. There is always a use for 2×4s.

Sure enough, this month’s copy of Family Handyman came and there were plans for building a workbench. Hey! I’ve got 2×4’s, I’ve got some scrap sheets of plywood, why not?!?

The directions in the magazine were pretty darn easy, particularly the cut diagrams reducing waste. I didn’t build the top shelf because I already have peg board on my wall, but here is the finished project:

New Work Bench

The 2×4’s were on sale when I picked them up. 8′ 2×4’s were $1.40 or so, and I used 8.

The plywood was scavenged (with permission) from the in laws garage: free.

Family Handyman subscription: ~$14

Not a bad workbench for under $40, huh?

Peace,
Tony

*I would have linked directly to the Family Handyman website, but it is heavy with popups and bulky to navigate.