Beginner Child and The Larva

These larva, nothing like what landed on my hand,
or on Beginner Child's bed, make pretty little cases
for themselves out of tiny pebbles.  Fashionista Larva.

While at my desk, playing Staries, a computer game I am currently addicted to, I felt something on my hand. Thinking my hand was just getting those first twinges of mouse overuse, I ignored it. I did shoot a look down and saw something moving on top of my hand. Ewww, it was some sort of laaarrrvaaa. Twisting, squirming in all its “larvaness.” I flicked it off onto the desk and smashed its little beginning life out. Damn, now I don’t know what it could have been, meaning: What kind of larva was it? Did it fall from the ceiling (termite)? Did the cat in my lap bring it in? Or is it the spawn from something living, unseen, in my office? 

I’m not seeing any on top of my desk. Did the thing bounce off my head, landing fatefully on my hand? Have others landed on my head, getting trapped in my hair? And why when I think of squirming things, do I flit back to the incident many years ago starring Beginner Child and “the larvae”?  

Beginner Child was around twelve years old and we were living in a house with open beam ceilings. Beginner Child had shelves above his bed filled with books, treasures, the sort of stuff most twelve year olds have. The top shelf was too high for him, so was unused. He was a fairly neat child, but wouldn’t always make his bed in the morning.  Sometimes I would make it for him, hoping that seeing his bed neat and orderly would inspire him to keep it that way.  

I came into Beginner Child’s room to put away some washed clothes and noticed some squirming things on his bedspread. They seemed to be in a line. Strange. I swept them up and looked up to the ceiling. There was a beam straight above the bed. I thought that what I was seeing was evidence of termites. Note, I didn’t have a tremendous amount of termite identification experience back then.

I checked on Beginner Child’s bedspread that night. Again, a few more larva-ish things were squirming on top of the spread, and in the same exact place-almost in a line. Okay, time to alert Himself, who was a part of my life then.  

Himself looked at the squirmers and looked up at the ceiling beam, “I don’t think those are termites.”

“Well, what are they then?” I like to further my education on all subjects whenever possible.

“I don’t know, let’s just keep checking and see if they stop showing up.”  I have since learned that this is the coping manner of Himself when he doesn’t want to deal with something right away.

Beginner Child came home late and went right to bed. I forgot about the larva until the next day. I made up his bed that morning. By that night, again we found larva in the same spot on the spread.

“We need to deal with these termites right away, this is gross.” I had seen enough and wanted it to stop. Thinking of how many might have fallen on top of Beginner Child in his sleep was very disturbing. Himself agreed we would do further investigation while Beginner Child was away that weekend.

Beginner Child left that evening to visit his dad. Beginner Husband had by this time acquired an “X” in front of his description. XBH moved many hours away and visitations were few: holidays and three-day weekends.  This was a three-day weekend, and so the bed stayed made up. 

Before Beginner Child returned home, I checked his bed for larva (this sentence is so wrong!), removed a few, while muttering to myself “this is ridiculous.” Looking around the room, I saw it could use some dusting. I began dusting the lower shelf above his bed, thankful there wasn’t any larvae on them.  Then, standing on the bed, reaching up as high as I could to dust the top shelf, my hand felt something weird, something outdoorsy.  

I felt around some more and grabbed a bird’s nest off the top shelf.  What the hell?  Where did this come from?  It wasn’t as if a bird had made it all the way into his room and nested without us noticing. 

Old bird nests, in their natural, abandoned state, are not at all like the sterile fake bird nests you see in home decor shops. Nope, they are actually dirty, with old down feathers from hatchlings and such.  That would be the condition of a typical nest, except in the nest I was holding in my hand that fateful day of dusting.  That particular nest had the usual downy feathers clinging onto the twigs, along with something organic stuck in some feathers at the bottom of the nest.  Turning over the nest, I dislodged a bunch of squiggly maggots, which fell onto the spread.  The bottom of the nest was infested with them.

I don’t know what the maggots were still living on.  The bottom of the nest had bits of something that looked like it had oozed down through from the inside.  I yelled for Himself to come see what I had found.  Being taller, he could see the entire upper shelf.  

Himself looked down at the nest I was still holding, then up to the shelf.  Standing on the bed, and looking eye level at the shelf, he announced that there were no other nests, but there were maggots squirming and rolling around on the shelf underneath where the nest used to be. In fact, they were rolling right off the shelf and landing on the spread below as he said this. 

I handed him the paper towels and cleaner. Lucky for me, Himself was the only one tall enough to do the job right.

We weren’t dealing with termites, we were dealing with live maggots living off of whatever had been in that nest.  Maggots that had been up there for who knows how long, rolling off the shelf for a week or so, landing on the spread, landing on...  

When Beginner Child returned from his visit with XBH, we told him about finding the bird nest.  

“Oh, I forgot all about it.”  He was very happy we had found it.  

“Where did it come from?”  

“I found it on the ground under the trees by the driveway.”  Oh, good he didn’t remove an inhabited nest.

“Was there anything in the nest?”

“There was a baby bird in it, but I checked and it was dead.”

Oh.

Skinny Jeans for Large Women?

Ok, I have gained some weight in the past few years, not gradually either. More specifically a lot of weight in the last three years. I now have a "muffin top", and my butt and thighs look like they belong on a woman who eats McDonald's crap everyday. How did this happen? Is there a limit to the amount of fat that will congeal on my butt? And now I need to buy some new jeans.  But when I'm out shopping all I see are jeans for other women. Women with no waists or thighs. Women with "low cracks" who can wear low rise jeans. I apparently have a "high crack", which looks really bad looming above the waistband when I barely bend over. This isn't a good look on a teenager, and it definitely isn't something anyone wants to see on a woman over forty-or-fifty-something.

And who the hell thinks women who wear a size 14 and up should wear "skinny jeans"? This is not a style that should be marketed, nor encouraged, to this size range. There are shows on TV that will throw this jean style out of your closet if you wear a larger size.  

I am trying to find jeans that do not shout to the world that... yes, I have let myself go to hell. I used to run.  A lot, and long distances.  I eat treats like I am still running 8 miles a day.  For some reason, I thought my body had a "weight limit".  That I would reach that limit and the weight gain would stop.  I have begun to reassess that line of thinking since I am over what I thought my limit would be.  I now see a future involving elastic waist “easy and care-free” pants.  Pants that have enough fabric to cover the mound of fat that will be bulging below and above my waist. Will I be the woman who shops in the "Women's" section - no longer welcome in the "Misses" section and decades past the "Juniors" section?  

My brain still wants to dress up in something short and clingy.  Something I could buy at Forever 21 or Banana Republic. But of course, I do have principles and some semblance of style, and won’t subject the public to my body in those clothes. No, I’ll just simply smile as the Teenager tries on anything trendy and looks fabulous. And yes, I did check out the "Plus" section at Forever 21, before I had a reality check and remembered the name of the store and that those days were over and  long gone.

I have begun to hate shopping. I can't find anything I want to wear that looks good on the current body I am inhabiting.  Perhaps that is my problem...I think I am just temporarily inhabiting this current body, and that somehow, if I just “think” of exercising tomorrow and “think” of not eating sweets, "my body" will slowly return to me. Though when "my body" returns, and it may still, I will miss the "girls" that came with this weight.  I actually see cleavage now, where once there was a wide valley. Granted, the "girls" need to be helped into place, but they are still pointing up, and so we'll let them be happy while the rest of me sinks into various lumps of cellulite depression.  

My worst “oh my god is that really me?” moment was a few months ago when I had to buy a new bathing suit. I am a born and raised California girl who has always worn very little to the beach. Even after having Last Son, in my mid-forties, I still looked (or at least I think I did) great in a bathing suit.  I always felt so bad for the kids at the beach or pool whose moms wouldn’t wear a bathing suit because they were overweight. These moms would still wear shorts or T-shirts, or both, sweating away.  Sometimes they would go in the water with these hide-a-fat-body outfits.  But not me. I wanted to teach my daughter, by example, to be proud of her body, and all its imperfections.  

Yeah, well, I still looked pretty good when those pearls of wisdom came out of my mouth. Back then, I was starting to gain some weight, but had not really hit my stride in volume yet. Teenager, who was barely seven then, said the most profound thing when she caught me staring in disgust at myself in the mirror. “Mom, maybe you’re supposed to look like that.”   How kind of her.  How elevated in consciousness she is. She is a wise child, and I wanted her to be right.

So what is Teenager saying to me now? “Mom, your face still looks great!”  

Last Son doesn’t see what the big deal is about my problem of not fitting into my clothes. This from the child who will wear jeans above his ankles because they still fit around his waist.

And what does Himself say when he is challenged to answer my loaded question, “I’ve really gained a lot of weight, haven’t I?”  

“I’ll still do ya!”

A Day Late and More Than A Dollar Short!

Late last year, Ma Nuo, a contestant on the popular Chinese TV dating show If You Are the One, became known as “the BMW woman” after confessing that she’d, “rather cry in a BMW than smile on a bicycle.” **

My seventeen year old BMW needed to be retired, and with the limited funds on hand, my choices were limited. I purchased a used KIA Sorrento. Not a move up, nor even a lateral move. But I needed a reliable vehicle with low miles, that could tow a dinghy trailer, and had a cargo area for the dog. The KIA fit the criteria. It’s less than five years old with super low miles, under a transferable extended warranty, meticulously maintained, and within my small budget.

The vehicle’s original owner was a Vietnam vet who died a month or so earlier, from complications of Agent Orange no less. The title was signed off by the vet’s mother and sister, aka executor, and sat in a plain white envelope on my kitchen island. This counter is, at times (okay - always), piled with stuff. Paperwork, mail, kid stuff, family stuff, you name it -stuff- semi-organized stacks of stuff. Because the purchase took all of our available cash, I had to wait for a few clients to pay Himself before I had the funds to register it.

The title in the plain white envelope was safe for weeks, just sitting there on the island.

Three weeks later, when the funds came in, I gathered documents to register the vehicle, except I couldn’t find the plain white envelope with the title. After looking a few more days, and reliving the moment when I realized I may have “thrown the wrong plain white envelope away” in my manic moment of cleaning up the stacks, I contacted the still grieving mom and sister to sign an application for a duplicate title.  

Within a few days after that, I was heading into town to both drop my teenaged niece off at the airport, and to finally register the KIA. The DMV is located about 20 miles away and I like to group my trips into town to save gas and time.  

As I checked my niece (an unaccompanied minor) in at the ticket counter, I realized that I had left my checkbook, along with my driver’s license, sitting on the kitchen island. My first crime of the day.

Luckily, no one asked to see any ID, and the niece was loaded on the plane, waved bye-bye to and flew off.  Now the Teenager, Last Son and I were off to the DMV. I was now scrambling to figure out how I was going to pay the registration and sales tax without my checkbook.My solution? Use a credit card, and as for a Driver’s License ID, well who else by the DMV would have a copy of that?

My wait at DMV was less than five minutes. Fantastic!  My paperwork was in order.  I approached the clerk’s window where the sign, “No Credit Cards Accepted, Cash and Checks Only” greeted me. Not looking good, but no worries, I did have my Debit Card with me, so same as writing a check, right?  

The clerk tallied the fees, and, in fact, she did it twice, and then had them checked by another clerk.  Was there a problem? Oh, yeah, but the clerk was actually trying to verify that the total of fees was really correct.  Unfortunately, they were.

I was one day-yes, only one day- late on timely registering the vehicle. This one day added over $300 in penalties, and taxes on the penalties, to my bill.The clerk had a sense of humor, at my expense of course, and took the Debit Card for payment. When she asked for ID, she still thought it humorous that she had to look up my license info. “Yep, that’s you.” She verified as my license came up on the screen. “Did you drive the vehicle here, without a license?” She asked. 

“Yes.”  I just admitted to driving without a license. The kids were right there next to me. Was I going to get a ticket, here in the DMV?  Nope, just a look and shake of the head from the clerk - whose humor was waning.

Handing her my Debit Card, I looked forward to leaving with new plates, title, and registration. Really, just getting out of there. This day was looking like a “glass of wine at 5:00 p.m. kind of day.”

After several swipes of my Debit Card the clerk came back to the window, “There are insufficient funds to cover the transaction.”  She said.  She wasn’t smiling anymore.  

“Let me call home and see what the problem might be.”  I felt a slight flush starting on my face while I pulled out the cell phone and dialed Himself.  After explaining to Himself  that I forgot my checkbook and was trying to use the Debit Card, he went online, verified there was plenty of money to cover the registration and taxes.  I then had to confess that there was now an additional $300 plus that was added on top.

“Well, we have it in the account, but it just took this week’s grocery and gas budget.”  

I confirmed there was sufficient funds with the clerk, but the card still wouldn’t work. I do have a daily limit on Debit withdrawals.  So, I left the DMV with an enormous stack of unprocessed paperwork, got into my vehicle and drove home illegally.

Returning the next morning, with checkbook and license, I got a different clerk who re-processed the paperwork and sympathetically shook his head as he took my check.  

“That’s a lot of money in penalties.”  Yes, I know, now let’s move it along shall we?

“Did you give the Disabled Vet plates back to the owner?”  He asked. 

“He’s dead.”  I responded.  “I’ll need new plates.”  

“Have you driving the vehicle with those Disabled Vet plates on it?”  He asked. 

“Well, yes, I thought having plates on the vehicle was better than taking them off and driving around without any.”  I thought this was a prudent reply to a trick question.  

“It is illegal to drive a vehicle with Disabled Vet plates if they don’t belong to you.”  It is? Who knew?  “You must take them off right away, and give them back to the owner.” Again, I’m back to contacting the grieving mother and sister.  

“I will.” I was out of banter by this time. Get me out of here!

It was 4:00 when I finally reached home with the official registration, title, and new plates. I promptly opened a bottle of wine. This was definitely a 4:00 p.m. time for-wine-day.

** (Okay, this really doesn't relate to my post, but I like it and it does have the word "BMW" in it.)  Lee, Amanda. (January 4, 2011). Ascendant Asia and the perpetual American hangover. Retrieved from  http://uwequilibrium.com/40 

Rules of Civility

Try this you "I drink mine black" coffee drinkers!

Each morning, my “alarm” is Himself bringing me a cup of coffee...in bed. Yes, I am truly spoiled. My successful wake up routine is: acknowledge Himself (he makes me open both eyes, look at him, smile and speak, before he leaves the coffee), scrunch myself upright against the pillows, turn on my reading light (our mornings are usually overcast), reach for my coffee, followed by reaching for the latest book I am reading. This ritual has worked wonders for me for a few years now. This morning, more tired than usual, I apparently tried to combine steps. I reached for my book with one hand, on top of which was perched my very hot coffee, while turning on my bedside light with the other. With the light was on it was easy to see the coffee cup slide off the book dumping coffee onto me, the duvet, the sheets, and the book. I am currently reading Rules of Civility by Amor Towles, which is a new release I checked out from the library. And now, I will be replacing Rules of Civility by Amor Towles before returning it since it is soaked in coffee and cream.    

I also had to strip the bed and wash the duvet, which wasn’t on my “to do” list today because spills with coffee and cream cannot be simply ignored or at least the volume of this particular spill. I think I just admitted that there were already a few drops on the duvet from previous mornings, but no matter, those minor spills have been overshadowed by this morning’s event.

A good friend of mine drinks her coffee black now because she has stained so many tops with spilled coffee. She claims straight coffee doesn’t stain like the dairy-infused coffee. Must I give up half ‘n half to be able to spill a few drops on the duvet without guilt? (I am convinced the only reason I didn’t get seriously burned this morning is that there was half ‘n half in the coffee) Half ‘n half in the coffee is part of my morning ritual. To me, drinking black coffee is like...yelling to the world you are not a wuss! (Really? Who cares?) Or,“I don’t need no stinking cream,” when really you just forgot that you drank the last drop the day before and are trying to cover for your lapse of picking some up at the store. And for the record, if we are out of half ‘n half, the substitute in this house is two-percent milk with a dollop of whipped cream (yes, whipped cream is usually in the fridge. This combination works, but amazingly it is kind of too sweet for me.) I don’t take sugar in my coffee, but I recognize that people do.  Do I tell them to “just drink it black, like it was made to be drank?” No, but that comment has been said to me when I ask if there is any half ‘n half. For those folks who clean up after others...how many half drank “black coffees” do you toss out compared to the ones with coffee and real half ‘n half? We coffee-and-cream drinkers don’t leave any I assure you. So, I ask, who are the true coffee-connoisseurs ?

For the record, regular, skim, or nonfat milk is not a palatable substitute for half ‘n half. Non-dairy “creamers” are chock full of chemicals and even after you dump a 1/4 cup of suspicious powder into your coffee, the texture, taste and “whiteness” just doesn’t cut it. Drinkers of coffee, black, or even black with sugar, think this powder crap should satisfy us coffee and cream drinkers, and keep it around for “us.” Seriously, don’t bother. We real coffee and cream people won’t be stirring that powdery toxin into our coffee, so the stuff will sit there on your shelf for months, if not years. Save your money by not buying the fake whitener at all, or pony up for the real stuff.   

What about tea? Well, I am a fan of tea. Drinking good tea black, or with a touch of honey, would suffice for many years. But then a British friend turned me on to “real English tea,” the kind that is fresh-brewed and served with milk and a spot of sugar. It was fabulous and definitely capable of replacing the coffee in my morning ritual. There I go again with the dairy accompaniment though, and a need for an official electric kettle.

Interesting Dairy Fact:  The Teenager did research on Iceland for her Biology class and discovered that Iceland used to be covered in forests. The Danish Vikings/settlers wouldn’t give up their love of dairy products, so the early settlers cut down most of the island’s forests to provide grazing land for their beloved cows!  Even for the sake of their new home’s environmental health, they wouldn’t give up their dairy. I’d like to think I would have, for the sake of my new home, but since whipped cream and butter are part of our holiday food pyramid, it seems I too would have ravaged the land in my quest for cream.

The dryer just beeped. Time to wrestle with the comforter and duvet cover, make the bed, and shop for a replacement copy of Rules of Civility. Coffee with cream, in bed, reading a book with this title... my own “rules of civility.”

Need help out to your car, ma'am?

While I am very impressed with the park job someone
did here, this would take advanced car finding skills that I do not possess!

What does it say about a person when they can’t remember where they parked their car?  Okay, that happens to a lot of us once in a while.  But, what does it say about a person that can’t remember what car they were driving and where they parked it?  

Today I tried to forcibly open the hatch of a vehicle that was not mine.  Leaving the supermarket, I pushed my cart up to the back of a SUV that I thought was mine.  Clicking my key fob several times with fervor, and pointing it at the hatch door like I was “casting a spell”, I finally thought I heard it unlock.  So, I tried to lift the hatch handle - with a lot of force.  At the same time as my hand was unsuccessfully pulling up the still locked hatch handle, I noticed the back window.  “Wow, how did my car get so dirty?”  Well, MY car is not that dirty.  The car I was trying to open was Not my car, not even the same make, or really even the same color.  Mine was several spaces away.  In my defense, the impostor vehicle was about the same size “spatially” in the parking space.  Lucky for me, the car alarm did not go off, though I am sure someone, in a nearby vehicle, saw me trying to force the hatch handle up.  Eleven years of driving a white BMW sedan and I never got it mixed up in a parking lot.  Three months with a Korean SUV, and I’m trying to open a Ford.  Apparently, I now drive such a generic vehicle, that it will not register with my brain.

I gave a little laugh, in case someone was watching me, and nonchalantly pushed the cart to my car where I proceeded to “cast a spell” until I heard the click. Thank a god the Teenager wasn’t with me.  Or worse, the courtesy clerk who asked if I needed help out to my car.  Who knew that I did?

In my moment of reflection, safe at home, I’m still a bit, well, confused.  Was I that preoccupied leaving the market?  Did I have a mini stroke?  Did I look before I merged onto the highway when I drove home?  Can’t remember actually looking, but I did make it home and I don't remember any honking horns.

What if that other SUV had been unlocked?  Egads, I probably would have opened the driver's door and got in before I figured it out.  Okay, maybe I wouldn’t have gone that far.  But what about in twenty years?  Is this how it starts?  

It’s time to put a cool sticker on my back window...  and do a good visual check before trying to open a stranger’s car.  It might also be time to start taking gingko biloba.

Future Farmer?

Could this have been 
Beginner Child later in life
had we stayed in Kamas?

During my beginner marriage, I lived in Park City, Utah.  When I was given the terrific news that I was pregnant, I told the beginner husband that living the ski bum life with roommates wasn’t going to work anymore.  So, I “forced” him to buy a house.  The nearest house we could afford was out in Kamas, Utah, about 25 minutes east of Park City, and a few miles north of Samak, which is Kamas spelled backwards.  This will give you insight into what that part of Utah was like.  

Surrounded by open fields at the end of a dirt road, it was the ideal place to grow up.  Or it could have been. Unfortunately, our only neighbors were the biggest thieves in the county, a story for another time.

Our tiny house was in the valley between the Wasatch Range and the Uinta Mountains- a beautiful rural area.  My Beginner Child had the run of the area as long as I could see him from the kitchen and living room windows.  As a preschooler, he spent his summer days in swim trunks and moonboots - the smushy kind for snow - popular in the 80’s.  Usually naked from the waist up, he would climb the haystacks in the cow field 200 yards away.  Beginner Child would take the dogs, cats and goats (yes, I had goats) for walks, climb under the pasture gates, and splash in the dirt watering troughs.  Idyllic, if you didn’t think of what was in that water, or that he could have fallen off the haystacks and been trampled by cows.  I remember being more bothered by the amount of muddy water he would bring in the house trapped inside his moonboots, then any danger he might have been in.  I was a beginner mother, and, regrettably, not an overprotective one.

When Beginner Child was in preschool, and about four months from starting Kindergarten, I began to inquire about the local school in Kamas.  In confidence, I was told that many kindergarteners through second graders could not write their names yet.  Most of the kids had not really traveled outside of the county.  And with Salt Lake City about 45 minutes away, it apparently was the “big trip” few had ever made.  Hmm, this local school did not look promising.  I did ponder enrolling him in school in Park City, but traveling early mornings in winter on those roads, in generally unplowed conditions, felt a bit treacherous.  Yes, I did have some sense of what might be unhealthy to his well-being.

The clincher was the afternoon I picked Beginner Child up from preschool and he told me that his teacher asked his class what they wanted to be when they grew up.  Normal question.  Most preschool boys will tell you they want to be firemen, policemen, baseball players, daddies, etc.  Well, at least that was what I remember growing up in California.

Well, in Kamas they grow them a bit differently.  Beginner Child relayed to me that a few classmates wanted to be ranchers like their dads- this made sense, and one wanted to be a park ranger (how did I miss meeting these parents?).   So, what did Beginner Child say when I asked him what he said at school?  “When aah grow up, aah wanna baaaale haaaay!”  He said it in a slow, drawn out, Utah drawl.  Yes, Utahans do have their own “southern drawl”.  Okay, I knew he liked tractors; I knew he liked to play on the haystacks; I knew he liked to be outside.  But baling hay as his life’s work?  I was thinking a bit higher in my aspirations for Beginner Child.  For the first time I felt he was in real danger.  Was it his acquired drawl or the content of his answer? It didn't really matter, I was truly frightened that if he stayed in Kamas he was destined to be a “can’t write his name by second grade” adult.  

We packed up and moved back to California before his first week of Kindergarten.

I am frugal, not cheap. There is a difference!

I am not cheap.  I am frugal.  There is a difference.  Yes, I reuse mousetraps.  Himself claims mousetraps are cheap so just throw the used trap and squished mouse into the trash, buy more traps and reset.  I say why not spring open the squished mouse, toss it in the outside trash (yes, this is important), re-bait and reuse.  Think of all the wood used to make those mousetraps that gets thrown in the trash.  And the little metal killing thing.  Now, if the last mouse victim left substantial remnants, and the trap cannot be cleaned up with a bit of Simple Green, then okay, toss it.  But efforts to reuse must first be made.

In the past, I have, perhaps, overstepped the boundaries of frugality and the nobility of reusing a product.   I say perhaps because actually, as I think back on one particular occasion, I’m not totally convinced I did cross over to “are you out of your ** mind?” status, though Himself still holds firm on his diagnosis.

No, this is not really my house, but the scenario is familiar.  And, really, I would have vacuumed the cat(?) hair off that black thing and mopped the floor.

After my dad died, I inherited his two cats.  Himself put in a cat door so our two kitties and the new two could come and go through the back porch door.  This door opened into a back room off the kitchen.  Add a bowl with dry cat food in it, and in no time we began to have raccoons, opossums and, yes, a skunk come nosing through the cat door.  Not good.  So, we put in a magnetic cat door flap system which required each cat to wear a collar with a magnetic thing that “unlocked” the flap so only they could come and go.  These systems are not cheap.  There is a real cost issue if a cat loses the collar or the magnetic thing.  And the cat who loses the collar can’t get back in or out.  Which leads to other problems.

One of my dad’s cats, Max, was already 14-plus years old to start with and while our family was away for Spring vacation, Max disappeared.  The cat care person never saw him while we were away.  For three weeks, we asked around for sightings of him with the neighbors, and called for him day and night.  Finally, we figured he might have gone off to die.  During these few weeks we had a bit of a heat wave, and a smell started to waft up from the floor in the back room.

With flashlight in hand, Himself, who is a big guy, went to search deep under the house worming his way, on his belly, inch by inch, in a crawlspace less than 2 feet high.  

“I found him”, came Himself’s muffled voice from way under the house.  “Yep, it’s Max and looks like he’s been under here since we left.”  Himself backed out of the crawlspace on his belly and asked for a garbage bag, a shovel, and something to put over his nose.  Himself verified Max was decomposing pretty fast, really stunk, and he would have to use a shovel to scrape him out of the ground and into the plastic bag.  Armed with his gear, Himself went in again, gagging a bit, and grumbling as he scooped up Max and moved him to the bag less than a foot from his face.

After a short bit, Himself’s feet showed up and wriggled out of the crawlspace opening, followed by the rest of him, the shovel and the black plastic bag.  

“Where do you want to bury him?” Himself asked.  “He needs to be buried quickly.  Parts are kind of liquifying already.”

“How about burying him over there? Be sure and remove his collar so we can reuse it, okay?”  That’s when I got the “Look”. 

“No, that’s not going to work.  The collar is kind of already sunk into his skin.” 

“Oh, how about just the magnetic thing then?”  

I was serious.  I didn’t see anything wrong in saying it then, and right now, I still think it was a perfectly reasonable and frugal thing to consider.  I probably could have just sprayed some Simple Green on it and we would have a backup in case one of the other cats lost theirs.

Max was buried with his collar.

Feeding the Pig? Really?

The advertising mantra of "pay yourself first" before you pay your bills in order to build your savings account...infuriates and depresses me.  I'm not sure Wells Fargo Mortgage would be too keen if I told them that we weren't paying them this month because we paid ourselves first.  Himself is a self-employed professional, meaning his income is not regular, and the current economy, which has been "current" for too many years now, has decimated any remote ideas of saving our "extra" income.  I looked at several websites that promote the 3%-10% per month saving rate.  They also stress that you have to live below your means.  When you have two children at home, and the oldest has just had our first grandchild, there is little "extra expenses" to cut out.  I find this theory is ludicrous.  The Feed the Pig website has "ways to save" on those little habits that suck up money before you know it like: cigarettes, lattes, lipstick, etc.  I couldn't find one item on their list that I actually use, let alone spend money on regularly, or irregularly.  I suppose if you receive a regular paycheck every two weeks, and your annual income is over $100k, you could pull it off.  But be sure to add a California coastal mortgage on a house that has severely depreciated in value, along with a couple of kids who do like to wear shoes and clothes now and again, and cars that seems to run better on tanks with gas in them.  It appears one way to "live within your means" is to let your mortgage be foreclosed and move to a cheaper rental.  Those of us trying to pay our mortgage on less income don't see this as a voluntary option.  Then, we have two kids at home - kids that want to eat, alot, because they are growing.  Food costs have shot up as fast as they have.  They aren't obese so I can't just buy less food "for their health".  They like to play sports, and that seems to always involve shoes or equipment for that sport: cleats, balls, basketball shoes dictated by high school coaches, etc.  So, cut out sports?  Sports are only for the wealthier among us?  Really?  Maybe if our kids weren't so active they would'nt need as much food.  But avoiding sports may lead to obesity, and then they would need to do some sports, which will cost money, and on and on.  Then later in life there would be health issues from the sedentary childhoods they had.  A vicious cycle for sure.  I think we'll keep the sports.


Of course, we do have pets and they will live longer if we feed them and take them to the vet when needed.  The pets came home during the "good income years" and now are older, but heck it appears they don't fit into the budget anymore either.


The "pay yourself first" folks have substantially more income than any middle-class family that I know. Period.  They are still taking vacations with their families, or do not have kids at all, but second homes somewhere.  Of course, the folks that I know who are living la vida rica started out with substantial financial help from their parents, either through first homes or trust funds, or have maintained kick-ass jobs and are always stressed out about losing their jobs. Probably because they don't want to live like us. Can I relate to them?  Only in opinions on food and wine.


Which brings me to my personal indulgence- wine.  I have probably spent a total of $200 in shoes and clothes in the past year for myself, and $100 came from birthday money.  I get my hair cut and highlighted twice a year (though as each year comes on, it might be every four months).  I do buy a bottle, two in the summer, of wine each week.  Am I buying Rombauer or Far Niente?  I wish!  Nope, my quest is to find a palatable Chardonnay under $10.  That price point, and my allowance of only one bottle per week, make it difficult to gamble on untried labels (a poor purchase cannot be remedied until the following week).  Once or twice I have had to decide to either drink the "poor choice" or pour it down the drain.  Note: I have only poured one bottle down the drain, or rather half a bottle as I continued to see if the wine got better as it warmed up - it didn't. So, really this indulgence can actually be a sort of punishment.  Then of course if I didn't purchase a bottle every week, I could put that $40 a month into a savings account.  Yep, at 1%-2% interest a month, Himself and I could live high on the hog when we retire.  I'll use the term "retire" in it's other verb definition: to go to sleep.  Like in "the final sleep".


As I write this I am thinking, well if I did save $40 a month on unpurchased wine, I might lose 30 pounds of weight in the deal.  It might take several months, and a bit of emotional adjustment, but I could do it.  Oh, but then nothing in my closet would fit, so I would have to purchase something new to wear.  Which would require spending money, the money in the savings account.   I'm mulling over the pros and cons of such a decision - keep drinking the glass of wine or eventually have to purchase new clothes.  Damn hard choice.  Damn economy making me make such a hard choice.