Business and Work – Susie Strauss

December 14, 2016April 1, 2018

Not available at this time

I noticed that Justin had left the computer on overnight, and he had left the screen on a website that showed that the synyster gates guitar he was looking for is not available at this time at that store. I wonder why he left that on for me to see. Is that a hint that he wants me to help him look for one to buy? I’ll have to remember to ask him about that when I see him after work today.

Money is really tight, especially around Christmas. I can tell you right now that there is no way I could afford to buy Justin a guitar for his Christmas gift. And besides, buying a guitar is a very personal choice. You can’t just go pick out anything that catches your eye. You have to play it and check to see if the sound is right for your style of playing.

October 30, 2015

Assisted Living: Pros and Cons

There comes a point in life when many people have to decide on whether to continue living independently, or transitioning to an assisted living facility. Each has its own advantages and disadvantages, and it’s best to consider these before making what can be a life changing decision. Weighing the pros and cons is important.

Assisted living services for seniors can provide a number of benefits. One of those is flexibility. As we age, our bodies change, and so do our needs. Properly staffed facilities can help us at any stage of life. These facilities often have staff on hand that can make expert decisions on our health and give proper advice on conditions that could be considered ‘red flags.’ This staff is available full time, which means in emergencies, people can trust that they will receive critical attention.

There are a few cons, of course. The biggest concern people have is costs. Assisted living requires early planning on the part of a person so that they can afford the month to month costs. These costs can also increase as a person’s needs increase with age. For these reasons, it’s best to start making economic preparations sooner rather than later.

October 30, 2015

I admit it

Okay, you caught me, I’m blond and sometimes it’s hard to keep me on one subject, ya know? My mind goes from one thing to another so fast sometimes I can’t even keep up with it but I usually come back to what I started with before you know it too. See we get a lot of ‘city folk’ as we call them and they can’t leave their laptops home because they think their lives will end if their hands aren’t attached to their laptops so the local businesses provide wireless internet to make them happy. Gotta do what you can to bring the customers in and keep them happy and coming back.

September 13, 2015

Sometimes you need a little bit of help communicating

I was quite interested to hear my friend Linda talk about her experiences working as a pharmacy technician at a local Rite Aid store. She had learned a bit of Spanish back in high school (she took two years of Spanish) but then shortly after graduating from high school she moved to Maine, where nobody spoke Spanish. People either spoke English or Canadian-French where she lived for twenty-nine years.

When she moved back to Virginia, she started working at Rite Aid, and found that a lot of customers were Hispanic, and did not speak English at all. She tried to brush up on her high-school Spanish, but it had been over thirty years, and although she managed to help most of the customers, there were a few times when she had to call the store’s translation company and put the customer on the telephone to facilitate the communication that was important.

When she was taking pharmacy technician classes, she learned that the second-most popular language spoken in the city where the classes were being held was Farsi! Clearly, the need for translation services will continue to grow for many decades to come.

June 10, 2015

Many Uses for Binder Clips

One of the most useful office supply items is the binder clip. I’m sure you know what item I’m referring to – it is a black metal clamp that has two silver colored wire clips that you squeeze to make the clamp open. Some poeple call them “alligator clips” because when you squeeze the clips the metal clamp is a little bit like alligator jaws that slap shut with a lot of force. If you have an extra large binder clip that clamps down on your finger – it does hurt!

The binder clips were used in offices as an alternative to 3-ring binders to hold a stack of papers together. There are different sizes of binder clips that hold any number of sheets from extra small binders holding 2-10 sheets to the extra large binders holding up to 300 sheets.

But I use these binder clips at home for other purposes, too. My open bags of snack chips and pretzels are rolled and clipped to keep the air out and the chips fresh. When I have a big bag of fresh vegetables, like carrots or broccoli, I roll the tops of those packages and put a binder clip on them, too.

To hold batches of grocery store coupons together, I use a small binder clip on the bottom so that I can easily flip through all the coupons and easily read the expiration dates.

Do you keep any binder clips at home for a different use? I’d love to hear what you use them for, too.

February 17, 2015

The Internet offers consumers different ways to order things

I don’t know about you, but sometimes when I go shopping online I am uncomfortable filling out an order form that requires my credit card information. With all of the recent publicity about hackers getting into systems through the Internet, I find more and more that I would appreciate finding the item I want to purchase, and then actually placing the order with a phone call. So I was relieved when I was thinking about buying something from the musician’s friend website to see “To place your order, call us toll-free at 800-449-9128” as an option for ordering. I think in this day and age, this is a little bit more secure than sending the information electronically. What do you think?

October 22, 2014

Shop Smart

Whenever making a purchase of an item that I plan to use for a long time, I try to perform what my engineering son likes to call “due diligence.” By that, I mean I will spend quite a bit of time finding out as much as I can about the product. I want to “shop smart” so as to not waste my money on a product that will not perform the way I want it to perform. I will try to find, and Read Full Review material on the product, do some comparison shopping online for it, and even check and see if there have been any complaints or recalls on the item.

In this day and age, I also try to buy American-made products, to support our economy. If we don’t help keep our country working, our taxes will end up going up to support the unemployed! And between you and me, I’d rather not join the ranks of the unemployed, so I always try to keep that in mind as well!

October 12, 2014

Any Big Sales This Weekend?

Sorry to admit this, but the Columbus Day holiday has always seemed the oddest and least celebrated holiday of all the official holidays throughout the year. We all learned a little bit about Christopher Columbus and several other notable world explorers while in school. And there is some controversy about whether Columbus really discovered America or did he land on a Caribbean Island or even Mexico or Central America instead?

But for me and anyone else who works in retail, Columbus Day means one more holiday to have an excuse for a sale and it is the last holiday before the big Christmas rush. I think the Columbus Day holiday has lost some of its shine in modern years and people are no so much interested in any sales during October unless it means they can get an early start on their Christmas shopping.

Do you know of any sales going on this weekend that will be worth going to the mall to save money on something you really need? I can’t think of anything, and I’m not willing to start my Christmas shopping yet, either!

September 18, 2014

The Internet makes doing business so much easier

When Aunt Jackie told me that she had no idea where to even start to look for an agent to buy car insurance from in her new town, I offered to help her out as best I can. Aunt Jackie is a sweet lady who has never bothered to learn how to use the Internet for anything other than reading and sending emails. Fortunately, I was able to help her look for burlington nc car insurance from here without ever having to leave the house! Just a few minutes online and I was able to hook her up with several options. I sure do love the Internet!

May 29, 2014

Comfy Work Clothes

Some days I wish I had chosen a career that had a uniform. If I wore nursing scrubs to work every day I think my life would be easier. I’d always be in something super comfortable and I could wear tennis shoes to work!

I only mention this because today after I left work I had to go to the grocery store for my weekly trip, pick up the kids, and drop off a few things at the post office. I was wearing a very smart looking tailored suit today along with 4″ heels. Running around town after being at work all day was taking a toll on my feet. I saw a woman in the grocery store as I was picking out a bunch of bananas in the most comfortable looking scrub clothing and cute blue sneakers. She didn’t look miserable from walking around in her “work clothes” like I did.

It was at that moment that it hit me. I bet most people that wear uniforms to work feel a lot better at the end of their day than those that don’t. They don’t have to spend time picking out what to wear or wondering if their shoes match their outfit. At the end of the day they get to go home or run around town in sensible shoes. I know this wouldn’t be true for all jobs but, off the top off my head the only job that comes to mind that might include heels as part of a uniform is a flight attendant. I bet even they have nice flats they can chose to wear.