"I'm a woman. Phenomenally. Phenomenal woman, That's me."

Did you notice the word phenomenally has the words men and ally in it? We have come a long way since the battle of the sexes and women's lib of the 60's and 70's.

That's not to say we have achieved equality yet. We still have a long way to go before men and women, white and African American and all religions have the same opportunity and respect. But we are getting there.

After all, having an ally or two can make you stronger.

"You can have it all. You just can't have it all at once."

Oprah Winfrey

     I agree with her completely. You can have a successful career. Or you can be a soccer mom taking kids to practices and recitals. It is impossible to do both well at the same time.

     Notice I said well. I don't think I have lost business because I said "Sorry, I can't show you that house tonight, My son has a ball game." But I feel guilty when I put clients off like that. I also feel guilty if I miss a ball game.

     You have to make choices about which one to put first at any given moment. There are going to be times, especially when the children are young, when that is going to be your first priority. When you are single and starting a career, or when the children are older and don't want Mom so much, your job might take more of your time.

     That is probably why Oprah is leaving her talk show. She is starting her own tv network, and I guess she knew she couldn't do justice to the talk show and get a network up and running at the same time. Although there are rumours she will start a new show on the new network.

     But she seems to have a magic touch and whatever she does will be great.  

"God does most of his work here by bodies half-dead, but alive in Christ."

                                                     Mary Slessor

My company, Keller Williams has it's priorities straight. They are, God first, family second and work third. We have a charity, KW Cares, which raises money both on the local and corporate level to help Keller Williams associates who have a lengthy illness or something that prevents them from working.

Last May we started the first annual Red Day in which each local office chose a service event to perform. My office chose to clean and repaint the putt-putt golf coarse of a local public park.

This year in December we will be raising money and toys for Child Protective Services to hand out to foster kids.

There are other real estate companies, large and small, out there who also support a charity. If you work for one of those companies, you know how good it feels.

There are many other ways individual agents help, through their church, missions trip, etc. We don't always hear about it because most of them don't like to toot their own horn.

I know in tough times such as these it is easy to start loosing faith. There seems to be so much need in the world that we don't know where to start helping. But faith is the only thing that is going to pull us through!

"To me every hour of the day and night is an unspeakably perfect miracle."

                                               Walt Whitman

     I thought about finding a Walt Whitman poem to include in this post, but I thought I'd better play it safe and not temp the copyright police. So I'll just use a bible quote instead. This is the day the Lord hath made.

     Make the most of it because wasted time is something you can't get back.  

"Women like silent men. They think they're listening."

                             Marcel Achard

No we don't! If a man doesn't talk, we think they're not listening. We want them to engage in the conversation.

But men are just the opposite. They don't like to talk about feelings and other deep stuff. They will do it, but they don't like to. They have found the best way to stay out of trouble is to just nod and say "Yes,dear."

There is also a myth that men don't spend a lot of time talking to each other or gossiping. O.K. I will agree with the gossiping part. The majority of men don't gossip. If a coupe gets divorced, their male friends will go" Did you hear Sally and Bob are getting divorced?" "Really?" Shrug. Then they will go on to the next topic, usually sports.

In the same situation, women will dissect Sally and Bob for an hour.

But men do like to talk as much as women. I grew up out in the country, and it was a very common event to see two farmers stopped on the side of the road, just talking. And I see men stand and talk in stores for a long time.

I love to people watch. I should have made my college major sociology.

So, women and men both like to talk, just about different things.

Friday the 13th. OHHH NOOO. LOL. I am not superstitious.

"Women are never stronger than when they arm themselves with their weakness."

                                                w

Weakness? What weakness? I've known women who are physically and mentally as tough as any NFL linebacker.

"Because of their feminine intuition, women have a special contribution to make to any group enterprise, and I feel it is up to them to contribute the kinds of awareness that relatively few men have incorporated through their education."

                                   Margaret Mead

I disagree with this statement. I think in today's society, with a lot of boys being raised by single mothers, or being in a divorced family where they don't have dad around full time, it is becoming acceptable for men to show feelings and even cry.

As for them lacking that feminine intuition, maybe so, but they also have gut instincts, which is just as reliable.

Want to know what's happening in Waco real estate? Wonder no more. Here are the sales figures for the month of October, 2009. As of November 4^th, there are 257 pending home sales. Between October 1^st and October 31^st, 178 residential properties sold. That compares with 171 sold in October 2008. The average days on the market was 138. Average list price was $130,411. Average sales price was $124,500.

Here is a breakdown of different price ranges:

0 to $50,000 = 19 units sold

$50 to $75,000 = 31

$75 to $100,000 = 35

$100 to $125,000 = 29

$125 to $150,000 = 22

$150 to $175,000 = 20

$175 to $200,000 = 9

$200 to $250,000 = 7

$250 to $300,000 = 7

$300 to $400,000 = 7

$400,000 and up = 1

There were 7 vacant lots sold, 3 Multi-Family properties, ( these were all duplexes next to each other in China Spring) 6 farm and ranch properties, and 1 commercial property.

Don't read that to mean commercial properties are not selling in Waco. Commercial agents usually don't put properties on the MLS. They have their own ways of advertising listings.

"Things are going to get a lot worse before they get worse."

                         Lily Tomlin

So there are degrees of worse? HUmm, interesting. So the economy is really bad, but economists are predicting by next spring it will only be bad. I'm so confused!

It's hard to tell the difference when you are struggling to feed your family and keep your house from being repo-ed and competing with millions of other job hunters for just thousands of jobs. But like Lilly said, things can only go up.

"Laugh and the world laughs with you. Cry and you cry with your girlfriends."

                                            Laurie Kuslansky

It's true that people are more receptive to you if you have a smile on your face and a pleasant upbeat attitude. So SMILE. Why frown and be so glum anyway. Things always get better.