The Easy-to-Find Information Center
Developed for those 55 and older (but anyone can use it).
Released March 1, 2008. See the box to the right for daily updates.
What happened the last time you used a search engine? 23,000 entries on 10,000 pages? There is a huge amount of information on the Internet, but it's not always easy to find just what you are looking for.
Slightly Creaky has been developed by a former AOL manager with considerable online research experience. We spend hundreds of hours every month searching through thousands of links looking for the ones slightly creaky people would use. Besides the obvious medical and health links, we provide information on travel, lifestyles, and home repair, while providing hundreds of suggestions for new hobbies, activities, and ways of being productive and keeping busy.
The index to the left shows an overview of these things, but we go far deeper. For example, in the "On the Table" category we include links to recipes, caloric counters, nutrition articles, and, well, whatever we may find and like. Many of the items have been submitted by viewers.
We annotate every entry so you know what the site contains before you click. Our 800-plus support group and medical information links provide alphabetical lists of ailments, including "orphan" diseases, with links to support and informational sites. Since it's doubtful you could tell what the "The Magic Foundation" is, for example, simply by its name, we give you an in-depth description. In most cases we copy the mission statements or purposes directly from the site. We try not to editorialize.
More than just links, Slightly Creaky wants to provide first-person experiences of slightly creaky people, those who are feeling the ailments of their age, but still remain active. Thus we seek volunteers to write brief (200 to 400 word) columns on a variety of topics, from geocaching to storm chasing, to thoughts on medical practices and pharmaceuticals. In fact, we encourage all of our readers to submit articles on any topic at any time.
Suggestions are always welcomed.
This month's Main Feature: "Retired and Living in Colombia." Part 6 can be found below.
Here is a complete list of our contents
with easy to access links.
Active Living. Home page for activities for active people. Not sure what to do today or looking for a new hobby? We provide hundreds of ideas.
- Life Styles. There are many environments in which to live: urban, rural, overseas, on a cruise ship, traveling in a motor home, or in a care facility. We provide basic information about all these places so you can research the possibilities.
- Travel. Specific vacations, cruises, tours, and similar activities.
- Recreation. Indoor and outdoor activities to give you ideas of things to do. Many of them you have never considered but are easy and fun. Others are quite challenging. Have you tried geocaching, locating places using GPS devices, a wonderful way to find new locations in your area? Interested in learning bocce?
Quick Links: Main Page
Amusement Parks & Places Sporting Activities
- On The Road. Whether you travel by train, bus, car, motorcycle, or motor home, there are destinations you do not want to miss. We have a huge listing of both the popular and the unusual.
In the Home. Home page for activities around the house.
- Entertaining. Whether you have one person visiting or five dozen, we provide links to sites to make entertaining easier and unique. There is also a suggestion about planning events outside your home, in your yard, a park, or a formal banquet hall.
- On the Table. Providing a listing of web sites that provide generalized or specific recipes and cooking suggestions. Each week we also feature a viewer's Favorite Recipe. Send yours (original only, not copied) to recipes@slightlycreaky. If you try any of the items on this page, please submit a review.
- Leaky Pipes. Covering many types of household (and outside the house) repairs.
- Pets. Mice, horses, cats, fish, dogs, and dozens more. We provide information about care and feeding, boarding, medical and health. Have you ever thought about putting a GPS tracer in your dog or cat (or iguana)?
- Hobbies & Interests. Indoors or out, this section looks at the way people spend their leisure time. Designing model train layouts, knitting, gardening, collecting, exercising, and even creating web sites. We also have a special page for Online Games.
There are 14 web pages in this section, To access them, go to the Hobbies & Interests Main Page.
- News, Information & Literature. Newspapers, news magazines, books (print and audible), and a considerable amount of information is now available online. If you are interested in reading the New York Times, looking up what is showing on TV, or checking out information in an encyclopedia or dictionary, there are a huge amount of resources here.
- Virtual Communities. This is a Slightly Creaky exclusive, bringing you web cams from around the world with monthly special features and updates. Watch cruise ships, traffic, take tours of zoos, and even peek into nightclubs and resorts.
Medical & Health. Home page for information about "the human condition." You can link directly to subcategories below.
- Medical Information. Links to medical information, dictionaries, encyclopedias, drugs and home remedies, advocacy, and groups that support many conditions.
- Support Groups. Six pages of annotated links to sites that support people and families with specific medical ailments and conditions. From the most common such as heart disease, diabetes, and vision problems, to orphan conditions that get very little attention. They are all here. Links to Support Group pages:
A - C D - G H - L M - Q R - S T - Z
- Family & Relationships. We can choose our friends, but not our family. Sometimes relationships are difficult, whether between spouses, parents and children, and siblings. This section provides links to sites that offer suggestions to improve and repair such situations.
- Nutrition. From the food pyramid to calorie counters, nutrition guides for general living or specific medical conditions, you can find links to helpful sites here.
Consumer Information. Information about things we buy and use. Each section contains annotated links to appropriate web sites so that you do not need to use a search engine. You will probably find things here that you never considered researching.
- Consumer Assistance & Scam Watch. Links to consumer information pages on the Internet where you can find product reviews and comparisons, safety suggestions, and product recalls. Includes links to scam recognition and assistance locations.
- Finance. Making handling money just a little bit easier. Our links and articles include writing and probating wills (and how to avoid problems), providing for a power of attorney, investing, scams, living wills, and dozens more topics. It also includes links for tax preparation and Social Security.
- Energy. Every day electricity, gas, and heating fuel get more expensive. There are alternative ways you can provide for these modern needs without having to depend on the mega-corporations. If "green" is the energy word of the 21st century, you'll find assistance here.
- Legal Information. With every state, county, town, and city having conflicting legal rules, we can not possibly provide all the information you might need. We do, though, have links to general law sites that update their information as needed. Also provided are dictionaries of legal terms. (We provide the links, but do not guarantee what you find is accurate. Consult a lawyer.)
Message Boards. It is our hope that the topics, information, and weekly columns will generate discussions.
About Us. Information about the people behind Slightly Creaky, our philosophy, goals, and volunteers. This area also includes our safety guidelines and a chronology explaining the development of this site.
Contact Us. We have a variety of E-mail addresses if you wish to submit an article, suggest a new link, or to otherwise get in touch with the Slightly Creaky team.
Volunteers. We need assistance in many areas (see the orange box to the right). This page explains in detail who, what, why, and how to become a volunteer. We also provide a list of those contributing articles and otherwise volunteering.
Legal Stuff. The required disclaimers, policies, etc.
This Month's Featured Article
(August 24, 2008)
We now have a place to stay. The house structure is up and we can move furniture in. Still no flooring over the bare concrete, and it feels dirty and is dusty all the time.
There is water connected from a nice spring at the neighbor’s. We have 3 separate systems that process the used water. From the toilet we have a pipe connection to a septic tank with a large leech bed, from the bathroom sinks and showers we lead to water into the front yard so the water is reused by the plants, from the kitchen and laundry the sink and floor drains all go to a drainage system and is absorbed in the soil downhill toward the Quebrada.
The only electric connection is a long extension cord that one of the workers attached to the electric wires up the pole. Pirated current I guess. We were cooking in a microwave sitting on a stool. The first improvement was a shelf to hold the microwave, much better.
During the construction phase, the first dump truck that delivered material got stuck in the muddy soil. The soil here is very fine clay that is hundreds of feet deep. During the rainy season mud is everywhere. I HATE mud. OK I had to live with that complaint. Before the rest of the fill for the placa could be delivered, we needed to put a lot of fill in the driveway so trucks could come and go. After the grading, the whole area was a bare muddy horror. The first consideration after the house itself was to start the long process of mud reduction.
My wife and I split the tasks. If it has to do with function, it is my job. For example the house design and orientation, that is Bill’s task. The garden, more a matter of form, fell to Gloria. We spent time both at the finca and also in the house we were renting in Chia. Every time we returned to Somondoco we passed a Vivero (place that sells plants). We would buy as many as we could carry in our little Samauri 2 door. The number would vary depending on what else we were moving.
Gloria really had her work cut out for her. The first thing she did was to plant around the edge of the placa on the front side and the end toward the gate. These were the highest sides of the placa, about 3 ft at the highest corner. The other 2 sides were nearly ground level and also out of sight to most people.
The drive way was about 50 feet of muddy gravel. I had 4 dump truck loads placed on top and smoothed out. Gloria wanted it bigger than I visualized but I have learned to listen to her so the driveway became pear shaped. She planted a row of shrubs and lower plants along the lower side of the driveway. The upper side was straight due to a drainage ditch and fence line of big stones that had been there for hundreds of years. It may well be a demarcation of the verada or section of the township. Our finca is in two veradas (so we have to pay 2 sets of real estate taxes).
If you look at the photos in Facebook, you can see what Gloria’s efforts have produced.
Here some plants grow very fast. We planted a tree, Tulipanes africanus, which was about a foot high when we planted them (5). They started to bloom after the second year, and now in the 4th year they are huge. There are 5 of them and for some reason they have grown in that order. #1 is the biggest. The trunk is more than 8 inches in diameter and it is more than 20 feet tall. We planted hibiscus and many of them are approaching 10 feet.
Here there is no growing season, things grow all year long. A few things haven’t grown very well. We put in about 30 coffee plants 3 years ago and so far have only gotten ONE coffee bean. That was because I bought very cheap plants. $10 USD planted, labor and plants included. I will need to buy some better plants and try again.
If any of you would like to correspond with me
I would love to hear from you, my e-mail is w_turley@yahoo.com . Until next month take it easy, I will be.
Bill Turley
Somondoco, Boyaca
Colombia
All of Bill's articles can be found in his archive area.
Brief Disclaimer
The obvious legal statement.
The folks at Slightly Creaky are volunteers. None of us get any salary or compensation in any form. We are not a corporation, just a few folks working out of our houses. If anything on this site bothers you, if you notice mistakes, please let us know.
While we do maintain editorial rights, things slip past, especially on the message boards. The submitted columns and news articles, as well as the postings on the message boards, belong to the contributor(s), not to the Slightly Creaky team. We are simply a vehicle bringing you information to the best of our ability.
Be sure to read our complete Legal Information and Policies