The Conejo Valley Guide "Welcome" blog covers a wide range of topics, local information, highlights of local things to do, compilations and other items. Focus is on information relevant to Ventura County and surrounding areas, including Thousand Oaks, Westlake Village, Newbury Park, Agoura Hills, Calabasas, Malibu, Simi Valley, Camarillo, Moorpark, Somis, Fillmore, Santa Paula, Ojai, Oxnard, Port Hueneme, Santa Barbara and Moorpark.
The Conejo Valley Guide® "Welcome" blog covers a wide range of topics, local information, local things to do, holiday event compilations, announcements and more.
Apple has launched a site called "Remembering Steve" in memory of Steve Jobs, who passed away two weeks ago after a relapse of pancreatic cancer. The site displays comments submitted from over 1 million friends, co-workers and customers around the world. Visit www.apple.com/stevejobs.
J.P. Gorham of Conejo Valley Cares was at the Thousand Oaks vs Westlake Village high school football game last Friday, September 23rd, when he and others in attendance were given an overhead show courtesy of Mother Nature. J.P. notes that these great pictures taken on his cell phone camera don't even come close to the changing colors and layers spectators were rewarded with. Perhaps those clouds distracted home team Thousand Oaks Lancers in their 38 to 6 loss to the Westlake Warriors. :>
Thanks to local dart guru L. David Irete we have this beautiful sunset to remember the last of our summer 2011 here in the Conejo Valley. And speaking of darts, check out the Ventura County Darts Association website at www.vcda.org. Darts is a great hobby (or perhaps a sport to some)...for nearly 100 groups and clubs around Ventura County, CLICK HERE.
The U.S. Postal Service announced today that unless legislation is passed this month, it is on the brink of default on its obligations. They say they need to cut operating expenses by $20 BILLION a year by 2015 to survive.
The Postmaster General spoke today to the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs. Here are some of the challenges the USPS would like to address with the help of Congress:
Retirement Benefits: By law the USPS is forced to contribute $5.5 billion each year to fund retirement health benefits of future retirees (in addition $2.5 billion for current retirees). The USPS would like to change this requirement.
Delivery Frequency: USPS wants to be able to be able to control delivery frequency...e.g. perhaps 5 days per week instead of 6. USPS states that in surveys, about 75% of the American public (up from 50% 2 years ago) favors cutting back service rather than cover l
StillTasty.com is a great resource for figuring out whether you should dine or dump the contents of your fridge and pantry. Very useful site for those who want to play it safe with their food. While I tend to go with "the smell test" when it comes to edibility, I found the site very useful and interesting.
StillTasty really nails it when it comes to usability. Just type in a word or two and you receive instant information. For example, let's take a look at hot dogs. Living in a house with kids, hot dogs are part of the Red Food Group that includes balogna, salami, bacon and Twizzlers. There are always hot dogs somewhere in the deep recesses of the fridge.
Type in "hot dog" and you get three options; cooked leftovers, opened package and unopened package. Click one of those and in very easy to read format using arrows they tell you how long you have to eat them from the fridge and freezer. Here's what StillTasty said:
Unopened package: Eat within 1 week after due date coming from fridge. Freezer life is about 1-2 months.
Opened package: Eat within 7 days after opening in fridge. 1-2 months in freezer.
Cooked leftovers: Eat within 3-4 days in fridge and once again 1-2 months in freezer.
That helps. Though hmm...am I really going to remember how many days/months have passed by...? I guess I'll just have to make a mental note of it.
I always wonder about hard boiled eggs. StillTasty says they last 1-2 weeks in the shell and 1 week out of the shell.
The owners of the site pull their information from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, FDA and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Do check it out at www.StillTasty.com.
OK, one more. An opened can of peanut butter lasts about 3 months in the pantry. Uh oh, better start sniffing those jars...
Last month I wrote about traveling with the kids to Las Vegas based on my recent experience taking 5 and 8 year old boys there for 3 days. The focus of that article was how to get there and get around. Now I'd like to touch on what I did with the kids in Las Vegas to keep it a fun experience.
Since I'm not a big gambler, I don't get out to Las Vegas very often, and I had never taken the kids there. But we wanted to meet up with grandma in Vegas, so off we went. So I had some research to do, namely where to stay and what to do there with the kids.
Keep in mind that this write-up is based on my one recent experience in Las Vegas and thus in no way is meant to be comprehensive. There are plenty of options there and I wanted to share what I learned. But by all means do your own research!
Our Hotel Experience
Let's start with the hotel. My primary objectives were to find a kid-friendly hotel with fun things to do, nearby other fun activities and has food that the kids will enjoy. Mind you, my kids are at the age where they get antsy sitting around and waiting in fancy places so I had to really put some thought into where we were going to stay. Oh yes, I don't want to stay at a really expensive place. Also, I wanted to stay within close proximity of the Strip.
Choosing the hotel is not easy. There are over 3 dozen large hotels on or near the Strip. After doing some research using Expedia and other online resources, I decided to ask people in Facebook, to which I received an outpouring of advice. Hotels referred to me were the MGM, Excalibur, Circus Circus, Monte Carlo, Orleans, Red Rock Resort, Mandalay Bay, Rio, Flamingo, Mirage, Vdara and Rio.
After more due diligence and thought, I opted to go with the
Let me start this out by saying that I, like the rest of you, am NOT a fan of paying taxes...income taxes, sales taxes, property taxes, payroll taxes, you name it! And my family is a frequent customer of Amazon.com. But as much as I dislike taxes and like Amazon.com, Amazon and other large out-of-state retailers should be collecting sales taxes from California customers. Fair is fair.
Last week, the State of California said that it will start requiring out-of-state sellers to collect and remit sales taxes on sales to California residents when it can be shown that the retailer has any physical presence in California, including the presence affiliates who receive a commission by promoting Amazon on their websites.
Amazon in turn swiftly sent a letter to its 10,000 or so California affiliates and told them, sorry, we're cutting you off. Yes, because Amazon is being asked to start collecting sales taxes like its competitors (e.g. Best Buy, Target, Walmart, Barnes & Noble, Costco, et al) do, they are throwing their affiliates off the bus and using them as a pawn. That wasn't very nice of them.
Let's step back for a moment. California is one of 45 U.S. states with sales and use taxes. (The 5 without are currently Maryland, Alaska, Oregon, Montana and New Ha
Conejo Valley Guide covers events, activities and things to do throughout Ventura County and surrounding areas.
Conejo Valley Guide® covers thousands of events, activities and things to do throughout Ventura County, California and surrounding areas.
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