Getting Back On Track

Ever notice how the longer you're away from your regular routine, the harder it is to get back into it?  That's what's happening to me now ...

I spent almost four weeks coughing to the point where I could only sleep, at most, an hour at a time.  Now, even though the cough has eased off considerably, I'm finding it really difficult to get to sleep.  Consequently, once I do finally fall asleep  -  usually somewhere between 3:00 and 4:00 in the morning  -  I have a tendency to either sleep until noon, or wake up early and then have a long nap in the afternoon.  I need to get back on track in keeping (more or less) "office hours" ... I also need to re-book all the workshops I missed, and get the job search up and running again.

The switch to Daylight Saving time this past weekend didn't help much, either; my body keeps insisting it's an hour earlier than it really is.  It always takes me at least four days to make the mental and physical adjustment; oddly, though, it doesn't take any time at all to adjust to putting the clocks back in the fall.  Of course, then I can just roll over and sleep for another hour  -  and as a person who's chronically short on sleep anyway, that doesn't hurt a bit!

I'm happy to report zero food wasted this past week!  There was one sad-looking forgotten apple in the back of the veggie drawer, but the guinea pigs leaped on it and it was gone in about three minutes, so not really wasted at all.

The work on my new room  -  shifting, weeding, organizing  -  is still going quite slowly.  Even though I'm not coughing much any more, I still get tired awfully fast.  I can work steadily for about half an hour, and then I have to stop and rest; if I don't, pretty soon I have to stop to cough for ten minutes.  Baby steps.  It will be finished before the end of the month.  Most of the furniture is in, the computer gets moved tomorrow, and the last bookcase goes in next week.  After that, it's down to organizing, and making the curtains.  And I already have two big bags of donations ready to go the next time we're headed that way.

It snowed this morning!  I was, naturally, utterly disgusted.  But by early afternoon it had stopped and pretty much all melted, so we were able to do the Costco run for the things that are (according to my price book) better value for the money at Costco than anywhere else in our area: milk, coffee, peanut butter, mayonnaise, and toilet paper.  Big Guy pouted a little when I said "No" to a $20 beef roast, until I reminded him that he had insisted we should eat out of the freezer instead of buying more meat until at least one of us is back to work.  Frugal win for me!

Big Guy spent yesterday pruning the huge old evergreens along the west side of the house.  Now we have a lot more daylight in the yard, and more light in the house.  He was worried that the sunshine might make the yard and the house too warm in the summer, so I reminded him that in the summer the sun follows a different path in the sky and we'd still have plenty of shade.

I was checking some of my old posts earlier today, and ran across something that may have appeared to be a big contradiction, so I'd like to clarify the house-heating situation at present.
When there is no tenant downstairs, we heat with the wood stove, since we only need to keep the main floor heated.  When there is a tenant, we use the furnace, since there is only electric baseboard heat in the bedroom of the suite.  And since we'd like to have the suite occupied all the time  -  after all, that's why it's there  -  we invested in the new furnace.  I'm happy to report that since its installation our gas bill has dropped by almost 35 %.  Combine that with the almost 45 % savings on the annual water and sewer bill since we had the (free) meter installed, and the huge drop in the gas bill we saw when we had the tankless on-demand water heater put in, and you can see why I'm not as unhappy about the cost of home ownership as I used to be!  Now, if we could only agree on what style of double-glazed window to put in the living room ...

I've given P the go-ahead to plant whatever she likes in the raised bed along the west side of the yard, and she has all kinds of alien-looking flowers and ornamental grasses planned.  Considering how little of what we've planted there in the past actually came into the house (as opposed to being eaten by the local wildlife), it's not really a loss for us.  My plan for this spring is to hang planters all along the chain-link fencing, with chicken-wire cages to keep the squirrels out of my herbs.  Fresh vegetables will be dirt cheap all summer at the farmers' markets, so I can buy and freeze enough to last a long time without going over budget.  Now, here's hoping the sun will shine the whole time our fruit trees are blooming!

Feeling Better, Sort Of ...

Wow.  I don't remember ever being sick for this long ... it's been three weeks so far, and I'm still coughing, though not nearly so incessantly or painfully as last week or the week before.  The doctor thinks I probably have/had pertussis (also known as whooping cough).  Oddly enough, though the cough was a killer and left me raspy-throated, achy-ribbed, and utterly exhausted, I had no other symptoms.  No fever, no rash, no green goop, no digestive upsets ... just the damn cough.  Said cough, I'm told, could take another week or two to finally disappear.  I'm finally starting to feel more like myself, though, and getting a lot of my energy back at last.  Which is nice after weeks of being too tired to pick up the remote and change the channel!

Of course, the job search had to be put on "pause" along with everything else; there's no mileage in applying for a job you can't go to the interview for, is there?  "Yes, I'd love to come in for an interview.  How about three weeks from now?"  That, I figured, wouldn't make a very good first impression.  So the plan right now is to spend the rest of this week getting the new workroom in order, and gear up the job search again next Monday morning ... including rescheduling all the Resource Centre workshops I missed.

Big Guy, bless his heart, tried to take care of me.  He made chicken soup, brought me Benelyn (with codeine for the aching ribs), intercepted phone calls ... then again, he also did his usual You-are-a-plague-rat-and-I-will-feed-you-with-a-slingshot routine.

And ... he painted my new workroom.  Just got up one morning, grabbed a roller, and did it.  Over my protests that I would do it as soon as I could stand up long enough,  He claimed he only did it because my new desk is taking up too much room in his workshop, but we all know better.  And I love him too.

So ... the painting is done, the windows are sparkly clean inside and out, the curtain rod is back up.  We're still working on the floor; it really needs professional refinishing, but for the moment all we can do is try to get all the paint splatters and scuff marks (from J's furniture) cleaned away.  I'm hoping to get the desk in there some time tomorrow; after that I can start shifting everything from the current room.  And yes, I'll be sorting and tossing/donating as I go ... nothing is going into that room until I'm absolutely sure it will be used.  I refuse to move things in that I'll just end up taking back out!

Our downstairs tenant gave us notice for the end of March.  Whereupon daughter P and son-in-law N promptly asked if they could move in on April 1st!  The suite is pretty small for two people and a dog (and two cats), but the price is right as P is still looking for work (she was laid off last fall), and N likes the closeness of the Skytrain for his daily commute.  So they have given their notice to their current landlord, and the weekend of March 31st - April 1st is going to be interesting, to say the least.  Oh, and did I mention that March 31st is daughter J's birthday?  "Interesting" may turn out to be far too mild a word for it ...

On the frugal front, things are going well.  Instead of buying paint for the workroom, I used primer and paint we had left from painting the living room a couple of years ago.  It's a lovely soft, warm oatmeal colour, with a white ceiling to reflect more light.  For drapes, I'll be using some fabric Mom gave me; a sheer lightweight silk patterned with pastel flowers.  Not my first choice, but it will work well with the room and is mild and inoffensive.  And if we can't get all the paint off the floor, I'll check out Freecycle and the local thrift stores for a couple of nice light-coloured throw rugs or sisal mats.

Convincing Big Guy to cook in smaller quantities is going to be harder than I thought.  Good thing we have that big chest freezer  -  which he now says we should be eating out of instead of grocery shopping!  I've been saying it for months  -  but now that it's his idea, it's a good idea!  ::sigh ::  But it looks like he might be back to work soon, which means I'll probably have to take over the cooking.  Now, I hate cooking.  Frankly, I'd rather scrub toilets than cook.  But if I do the cooking, I can control how much gets cooked, which in turn means I can cut the food waste way down.  We ended up tossing a quart of homemade chicken soup last week, because he made a huge pot of it and then stalled on batching it up for the freezer, and I was too exhausted most days to eat more than a tiny bit.

I was enormously amused by something I got in the mail a while back.  Last year I joined BC Hydro's "Power Smart" project; a couple of weeks ago I got a little package from them in the mail.  I opened it up to find ... half a dozen wooden clothespins accompanied by an estimate of how much I might save by hanging laundry up instead of using the dryer!  I giggled madly as I tossed them into the basket with the hundred or so I already have  -  I guess they had no way to know I've been hanging all my laundry for years!

Anyway, back to the floor cleaning.  I've been taking pictures at each stage of the room conversion; I'll post them when the room is finished.  Can't wait!

The Hunt Continues

The job hunt, that is.

Yesterday I went over to the Employment Resource Centre, and got a referral to another local centre that does various workshops on resumes, cover letters, interviewing, and so on.  I signed up for six of the workshops  -  it can't hurt!  My work history  -  and job acquisition history  -  has been so full of serendipity over the last fifteen years that I really have very little experience with things like crafting a winning resume and acing an interview.  All my jobs to date have either been through temp agencies, or through being sought out by employers.  Flattering, but not presently useful!

Funnily enough, I actually had an interview today.  A forwarding company had found my current resume (such as it is) on monster.ca, and called me to come in on about five hours' notice  -  was I glad I'd touched up the grey roots last week!  The interview went well, though rather quickly, but I don't think I'll get the job.  They seem to want someone with a lot more forwarding and NVOCC experience than I have.  But you just never know ... as I told Big Guy when I got home, "It's always a fifty-fifty chance  -  either they hire me or they don't."

* * * * * *

Moving J went more smoothly than I'd expected, all things considered.  We had everything loaded, moved, and unloaded, and the truck back at the rental place, by about 6 p.m. Friday.  Her helpers were willing and able, nothing (that I know of) got broken, and I only hit my knees on the trailer hitch six times.  My hands and wrists are still kind of sore, but I suspect some of that may be from a weekend spent almost entirely either knitting or winding yarn.  Once I can get some clear table space (don't go there!) I now have three completed sweaters to sew together.

The room proceeds, albeit a bit more slowly than I'd originally planned.  The walls, ceiling, and woodwork have all been washed, but I won't be doing the primer until my right wrist is less stiff and achy.  So it looks like I'll be priming on Friday, and painting on Sunday and Monday.  Furniture etc will start shifting Tuesday or Wednesday, since I want to give the paint plenty of time to harden up first.

* * * * * *

We got up this morning to another dry, sunny, beautiful (but very cold) day.  I spent the time before I had to get ready for the interview wandering around the yard, making mental notes of everything I'd like to do to prepare for this year's garden, and thinking I'd get started on the winter debris cleanup tomorrow morning.  All the fruit trees need pruning, the lawn needs a good raking to get rid of what the evergreens have been dropping on it all winter, and there are monster weeds everywhere.  Naturally, the morning paper is predicting rain for the rest of the week ... It rains with monotonous regularity this time of year, especially on those rare occasions when I have the energy, the motivation, and the time to get out there and do something.  Sigh.  I may have to console myself with graph paper and seed packets.

Or maybe I'll start another sweater.

One Week In

A week into 2012, and not a lot to show for it so far ... except on paper.

I've been on the internet for at least four hours every day, and so far have found exactly three jobs worth applying for.  The rest are all either minimum-wage, which wouldn't even come close to paying my share of the mortgage let alone anything else, or commission-only sales, or jobs I'm not even remotely qualified for.  I can hear you now ... "Take the minimum-wage job while you look for something else!"  No.  If I can't find a job that pays enough to live on, I'm better off collecting EI and not working.  And believe me, minimum wage would be far less than EI.  Besides, that's why it's called Employment Insurance.  I've paid more into it over the years than I will ever collect, and I'm not taking anything I'm not entitled to.

Apart from the job search, I have been getting things done, though you'd never know it by looking around the house!  All the holiday paraphernalia is packed up & stowed away and the mending pile is shrinking visibly at last.  And I've been making plans ... not just in my head, but in my "Projects" notebook ... complete with action timelines. 

One thing about cleaning out the basement really hit a nerve with me.  We found a tall stack of boxes that had been shoved way in a dark back corner behind the old furnace when we first moved in.  After seeing what was in them all, I sadly realized that it all had to go, due to age and potential health hazards ... nine cases of home-canned fruit, jams, and relishes, all dated 2004 or earlier.  Lids into the recycling, contents into the compost, jars washed and stored away ... that much waste just hurts.  I try to comfort myself with the knowledge that it will never happen again; as soon as the shelving is all put up in the basement, I'll be organizing the "home-canning centre" to make sure all the home-canned food gets properly rotated and eaten while it's still good.  Which also means that since there's just the two of us (as of the end of this month), I won't be canning in massive quantities any more, except for the jams and jellies I plan to give as gifts.  I suspect that when the boxes were first put there  -  not by me, I assure you  -  they were moved with a dolly as one stack, and someone thought they were boxes of empty jars.  That won't happen any more either; all the empty jars are being packed into milk crates, so we can tell at a glance that they're empties.  The full jars will go into labelled and dated cardboard boxes, with a tally sheet on the front of each box so we can also see right away how many jars we have left of pickles or salmon or applesauce or whatever.

Tomorrow's afternoon project is a pantry cleanout and inventory.  Since Big Guy does almost all the cooking, he also does almost all the grocery shopping.  But he's short on patience and has admitted he can't see what he's looking for if it isn't exactly where he expects it to be, and the result is that he tends to go out and buy stuff we already have.  Case in point: in various cabinets in the kitchen, while helping him look for egg noodles, I found eight  -  yes, eight  -  packages of elbow macaroni ... but no egg noodles.  The really tricky part will be persuading him to mark something off the list when he uses it, so we can keep track of what we have plenty of and what we're almost out of.  I can see myself going through the shelves every week and updating the inventory.  Sigh.

I've also begun making a detailed inventory of all my sewing, knitting, and craft supplies and equipment.  As soon as I've completed the move into J's old room, I'll be able to start putting things together for next fall's craft sales and this summer's Renaissance Faire booth, as well as the items I want to make as gifts for birthdays and next Christmas.  I've already gone through my clothing-fabric stash, and paired up each length with the pattern I plan to use it for, and the necessary notions such as thread, buttons, and zippers.  Next week I'll do the same with the yarn stash and knitting patterns.  I must admit I'm not looking forward to measuring myself all over and adjusting my dressmaker dummy accordingly.  But it will be so nice to be able to look at the "to make" list, pick something from it, and actually have the working space to do it!

This year, as stocking-stuffers for Big Guy, I knitted some wool frypan-handle holders.  His mother used to send him a batch every few years, but since she died the collection has gradually eroded down to two, both very ratty and almost completely worn out.  Well, he loves them!  Not only that, but he's going to take a couple with him on his next trip to his favourite outdoor store, to see if they'd be interested in buying them from me as a regular thing.  I told him even if they are, whether or not I go for it will depend on how much they're willing to pay me for them; they're a business, not a charity, and will need to put enough markup on them to make it worth their while to carry them.  So the main considerations are how much they'd pay me, and how cheaply I can find a source of good-quality pure wool ... definitely not something I can pick up at thrift stores!  In the meantime, I can use up the rest of the wool I bought for a few to put away for the craft sales; I can easily knock out six or eight of them a day.

Have I mentioned the university courses I have on DVD?  Earth sciences, economics, oceanography, anthropology, history, climatology, and astronomy  -  now I have to decide where to start!  Each course is a series of half-hour lectures, with accompanying guidebook and suggested reading list  -  but I want to start them all first!  And I have a lovely tall stack of new books, all received as Christmas / Yule gifts ... does this qualify as an "embarrassment of riches"?  It does to me!  I'm sorely tempted to put the job search on hold while I read, and watch lectures, and work on all my future craft projects and wardrobe additions ... sometimes being a responsible adult has a downside.

I'm ending this post with a question, and hoping someone out there has read this far and perhaps can answer it.

This year, I want to learn to knit socks.  However, I can't wear wool ... do knitting patterns for wool socks work just as well with synthetic yarns?  I'll be grateful for any and all advice received!

It's Official

We got it in writing on Wednesday ... the office is closing much sooner than we expected.  My last day at work will be December 30th.  Happy New Year.

My first thought was "I'm glad I didn't do much Christmas shopping yet."  My second was "I'm glad Big Guy is still working."  I'm ashamed to say it took me until the third thought to feel badly for N (our office manager / supervisor), who has a little one at home and whose husband's work has been somewhat sporadic lately (not his fault in the slightest, the work just isn't there).

So, here I am again  -  job-hunting in an economy that's as unsettled as it was the last time I was laid off, with even bleaker prospects in my particular field.  

And in a corporate move that really adds insult to injury, I get to spend part of my remaining time at work training my replacement!  Now, I'll do the very best I can with her in the inadequate time I have  -  because honestly, even if she spent a month sitting with me all day every day, it wouldn't be enough to teach her everything.  But a couple of hours a day on the phone isn't going to cut it, and I feel badly for her.  I'll do everything I can for her  -  none of this was her doing, and I'm certainly not going to throw her under the bus just because I'm not happy with upper management.  I have to admit, though, that there's a not-so-nice part of me hoping that said management will shortly come to realize how badly they shot themselves in the foot with this particular decision.  I'm also deriving a bit of satisfaction from hoping they all lie awake every night through the holiday season, feeling guilty about their execrably poor timing and the effect it's having on all of our families.

**********

Yesterday's gathering went really well, even though there were some last-minute no-shows.  We talked and laughed and ate  -  and  ate  -  and ate  -  and enjoyed each others' company.  I ended up pressing containers of food on everyone to take home, because there was so much more left than I expected.  There are still enough leftovers that Big Guy and I won't have to make work lunches until at least Wednesday, and today I asked him to please not make anything large for tonight's dinner because there is no space in the fridge for any more leftovers!

Now it's time to get creative with gifts.  The stocking stuffers will be easy  -  traditionally, everyone gets socks and a chocolate orange (addictive, those!) in their stockings, so there isn't too much space left to fill.  A trip to the dollar store will take care of the stockings nicely, and with luck provide a few other gifts.  Thrift stores are always good too  -  in fact, Value Village is daughter P's first choice for gift cards!  I raised her well ... I just wish I'd known a couple of months ago that the layoff was coming; I would have made time to make more gifts myself.

I'll spend this afternoon redoing my shopping list, and shop on my way home from work every day.  We have Friday the 23rd off, so anything I haven't acquired yet will have to be picked up then.  Friday evening is Chinese food and Miracle On 34th Street with Mom and sister S, and Saturday is for wrapping and tree-trimming, and watching White Christmas and The Muppets' Christmas Carol and the original Grinch and Alistair Sim as Scrooge.

So ... my house is cleaned and decorated (except for the tree), I have plenty of homemade goodies on hand, and a plan for an affordable holiday.  I'm more determined than ever to enjoy my family, count my blessings, and not let a little thing like unemployment stop me from having a wonderful time!

Projects And Updates

Yes, I know it's been longer than usual since my last post.  I could go on about getting caught up in other things, or delayed by events outside my control, but the truth is I just kept putting it off until here I am, a week later than I planned.

It's true that a lot has been going on here  -  some of it good, some not so much.

I'll start with a good thing  -  a finished project.  Yes, a sweater is actually finished!  And here it is:

Please ignore the mess behind it  -  the "get-the-workroom-cleaned-up-and-organized" project is not going as quickly as I'd hoped.  But hey, one finished project is better than none  -  isn't it?  And the second sweater is almost finished; I just have to assemble it and darn a few ends in.  So maybe  -  with luck and hard work  -  more things will get done.

This year's food garden was almost a complete loss, thanks to uncooperative weather and steady rain through almost all of pollination season.  So far we've managed to harvest one stalk of rhubarb, two tomatoes, and a handful of chives.  The apple tree, however, contrived to bloom during the only dry few days we had all spring, and the apple crop was so abundant we were afraid branches would snap from the weight of the apples before we could pick them.  One five-gallon pail at a time, they're coming into the kitchen to be canned as applesauce.  We'd hoped to slice a bushel at least and run them through the dehydrators, until we realized that every one of them has had at least one bite taken out of it by the squirrels.

Every.  Single.  Apple.

You'd think that after the first, oh, hundred or so bites, the furry little buggers would have figured out that all the apples taste the same, but no.  Apparently our squirrels, while handsome and sometimes entertaining, are not very bright.

And the basement project is almost at a standstill through no fault of my own.  Or anyone else's, really ... accidents happen.  It's not my co-worker's fault he had a bicycle accident last weekend.  But because of that, instead of having a week off to really clear out the basement, I was called back into work.  Yes, I'll get the days off some other time ... but probably not until next spring, since we are coming into the busiest / most hellish time of year for my department.

This slows the basement work down rather seriously, since the only time left for it will be weekends, when Big Guy always manages to have something "more important" to do and I can't move the big heavy things that need to be moved without his help.  Why do they need to be moved?  So that our huge old clunky noisy 43 % efficient furnace can be replaced with our new (still in its wrappings in the basement) small quiet 93 % efficient furnace.  I would really love to see that happen before we actually need to turn a furnace on again this fall, but I know if I leave it up to Big Guy it will be at least another year before anything happens.

So my plan of attack has morphed into a plan of sneak attack.  I'll be down there in the evenings clearing out all the small stuff, and on the weekends I'll just cajole him into helping me with just one or two large things at a time.  Wish me luck!

In other news, J has rounded up two potential roommates, and their plan is to find somewhere to rent by the end of October.  We'll miss her, and the move to paying rent will slow down her debt repayment plan, but I can understand her reasoning.  She's working two jobs now, one full-time and one part-time, and the almost-two-hour commute each way is killing her.  She goes to work, comes home, sleeps, and gets up and goes back to work, seven days a week.  Living closer to work will give her a little time to actually have a life.  Maybe even get some laundry done ...

This project has had side effects, of course.  Big Guy is not happy with the last "baby" leaving home, of course.  And all the bins and boxes of her stuff from the basement and the attic will be all over the living room until she makes time to go through them all and do the keep-trash-donate sorting.  But ... the day after the last of her possessions leaves that big sunny front bedroom, I'll be in there with a bucket of paint!  That room will become my new workroom, this little 8-by-11 room will become the den / guest room, and she already knows that if things go south and she has to move back in, she gets the den and not her old room.

Some people have said I'm unnatural, or a bad mother, for actually wanting my nest emptied ... but hey.  She's twenty-six, she has a good education and a good profession (chef) ... it's time.  Time for her to spread her wings in the real world, and time for Big Guy and I to be able to sit back, watch our girls all out on their own and independent, and know that we did a good job as parents making sure they could make it on their own.

Much Ado About Something

It's been an odd couple of weeks  -  a lot to do, no time to write about it, and a lot of up-and-down-and-back-and-forth without really getting anywhere.

I did get to spend a weekend with my friends in Seattle, though, and it was wonderful.  I just wish I could afford to get down there more often.

Why do some men seem to go out of their way to find the most difficult, time-consuming way possible to do the simplest things?

All I wanted to do was pick the ripe apples off the old Gravenstein tree in the side yard.  So I went out back and asked Big Guy for one of the dip nets from the fishing gear.  Well, no, I couldn't do that, because the net was too big and I'd knock down too many apples that weren't ripe and on and on ... but he'd fix me up something much better.  Okay, fine.  Two hours later, after much banging and cursing which I studiously ignored from indoors, he proudly presented me with a new, hand-made-just-for-you-dear ... dip net.  Yep.  It's slightly smaller around than the one I would have used, and the handle is almost a foot longer, but overall ... it's a dip net.  Well, after thirty years with him I know when to keep my mouth shut except to smile sweetly and thank him.

So this evening I have a few gallons of apples to wash, peel, chop, and cook down.  The actual canning (or freezing, if I get too tired) will happen tomorrow night.  And by the weekend, lots more apples will be ripe and I'll start over. 

There isn't much progress to be seen in other projects.  The pink sweater sits forlornly on the needles, no longer than it was two weeks ago.  The basement doesn't look any different, although a fair bit of stuff did get either tossed or relocated.  Lots of laundry got done, but no mending, and my workroom is pretty much untouched.  And yet I feel like I've been working non-stop on all kinds of things ... trouble is, most of what I've been doing has been just catching up on the housework that didn't get done while I was in Seattle.  Because of course, Big Guy and J "meant to do it" but somehow it never happened.  Story of my life.  Sigh.

The apples and the basement have to be the top priorities for the next couple of weeks.  The apples because, well, once they're ripe they won't wait, and the basement so that the guy who's coming next week to give us an estimate on installation costs will be able to see what he needs to see and measure where he needs to measure.

Oh, and can anyone tell me how I managed to acquire the head cold from hell this week?  My head is pounding, my sinuses are throbbing, and my nose has already been wiped raw.  Total misery  -  but I'm doing my best not to share it with anyone.

Random Bits, Large And Small

I can't decide which I dislike more  -  the days when life is just one damn thing after another, or the days when life is just the same damn things over and over and over ...

Now, I'm not talking about my job, which is pretty much a combination of those two kinds of days.  I knew it would be like that when I went in, and there's enough variety to keep it interesting, and I'm pretty darn good at it.

I'm talking about the time I don't spend at work.  The hours spent in the arms of my loving family.  The hours that went pretty much like this, every two minutes, all weekend long:

Mom, I need you to ...
Where's the damn ...
Mrow ...
Honey, can you come out here and ...
Why isn't there any ...
MROW!

Which is why I didn't get back here to post over the weekend.  Honestly, a five-minute stretch without anyone wanting anything would have done wonders for me!

There's a good chance that some time in the next few days I'll be posting big signs all over the house that say, in large red caps:

THERE IS NO TOILET PAPER FAIRY.

THE MAID QUIT.  DO IT YOURSELF.

DON'T PUT THAT DOWN, PUT IT AWAY.

I went to work yesterday morning secure in the belief that at least there I could pretty much know what to expect and get some actual work done ... Not so much.  The phones just would not stop, the problems popped up like mushrooms after a rainy night, and the whole day's work was done in ninety-second increments between phone calls and frantic e-mails.  By the time I got home last night, all I managed before I fell over was getting changed and stuffing a sandwich in my face.  Today was a little better, but I'm not holding my breath for tomorrow.

On the home front, I just keep chipping away at things.  Every time I walk into a room  -  any room  -  I look for one thing that needs doing, and do it.  Wastebasket full  -  empty it.  Cat bowl empty  -  fill it.  Something out of place  -  put it away.  Something missing  -  go find it.  You get the picture.  At the end of the day it doesn't seem as though I've done much, but by the end of the week there's a noticeable difference.  Works for me.

I've booked a vacation week mid-September to have the old furnace hauled away and the new one installed.  I'm optimistic about having most of the cleanup done before then  -  or at least enough of it that nothing will impede the installation process.  The real hurdle will be getting the Big Guy's cooperation; he won't do anything during the week because he "worked hard all day" (so did I, son) and he won't do anything on the weekends because he "needs to get the truck running to haul all the crap away".  Sigh.
 
Since this is a three-payday month, I'm also pushing the idea that the single-glazed living room window can be replaced this month  -  or at least, before October.  I've even offered to use the third paycheque to pay professional installers.  Of course, Big Guy is no end offended by this ... he and his buddy G replaced all the other windows in the house, and did a fine job.  But the truth is, if I left it to him to install this one, I'd be waiting until about this time next year for him to "get around to it".  Not to mention that his favourite time of year for big projects involving exposing the whole house to outdoor temperatures is ... the week before Christmas.  I can't figure it out.  Last winter, he decided on December 21st to paint the kitchen ... doors & windows wide open for days, during the coldest week in the recorded history of this area.  Granted, December 2009 was not his fault  -  we'd had it on good authority that the roof could wait until April, which turned out not to be the case, and we had roofers up there ripping everything back to the bare rafters and replacing it all, right up through December 23rd.  December 2008, he refused to put up the Christmas tree until the living room was painted ... I'm scared to even think about what he might pick as the pre-Christmas project this year.  Probably the damn window.

And something that warms my thrifty little heart:

March 2010, after paying a $900 annual water & sewer bill, I decided to take advantage of the city's free water meter program, and had one installed.  May 2011, I got the quarterly metered water & sewer bill ... and found that since were were no longer paying the city's "flat rate" but only paying for what we used, we still had  -  ta daa!  -  almost $300 credit.  I got the August bill today  -  and we still have a $22 credit.  I'm a very happy water-conserving camper tonight!

Projects, Plans, And Possibilities

Projects.  Of the many currently in process, I'm starting to see actual results on a few ...

The sweater is finished.  Actually, it's been finished for some time, but I keep forgetting to charge the camera batteries.   Maybe next week  -  in fact, definitely next week, along with pics of ...

Next weekend's Renaissance Fair costume.  I have all the pieces cut out for the underskirt, blouse, hat, and most of the vest.  All that remain to cut out are the outer vest surface (the layer that shows) and the overskirt; but since they are plaid, and I'm a little obsessive about matching the plaid lines perfectly, I'll be putting the rest of the outfit together over the next three evenings, and tackling the plaid from start to finish on Friday (I have Friday off in exchange for working BC Day on Monday), when there will be lots of nice bright daylight to work by and plenty of time to get it absolutely right.

The mending pile seems to be stuck in some sort of recurring time loop.  I mend and I mend but the pile never gets any smaller.  I suspect my family of sneaking items into the middle of it when I'm not looking.

Replacing what I lost when I hard to wipe the hard drive is slow going, but I'm chipping away at it.  Most of it is re-entering and updating files from hard copies  -  bank statements, insurance inventory, and so on.  And yes, this time everything is being backed up on CDs.  My friend D (the tech wizard) thinks he may eventually be able to retrieve most of the photos I hadn't put on CDs yet.  

I've started another sweater  -  just a nice casual cotton/acrylic hoodie, simple but pretty  -  but I suspect it will end up being a birthday gift for my sister S, because it's pink.  Strawberry-ice-cream-pink, which is one of her favourite shades.  And since her birthday isn't until the fall, I might even get it finished in time!

The basement cleanup is moving along, though rather more slowly than I like.  I'm rapidly approaching the point where I will just haul everything that's not mine  -  in other words, pretty much everything that's still down there  -  out into the back yard.  Anything that's still out there a week later will go straight to either a local charity or the dump, depending on what it is, what condition it's in, and what mood I'm in by then.  Whatever it takes to get that space cleared out so that we can install the new high-efficiency furnace before it's time to turn the heat on again.

I have to confess, as much as I love the Big Guy, this is one area where he makes me want to beat him about the ears with a brick.  He talks endlessly about the things he's going to do  -  replace the furnace, clean up the back yard, replace the old single-glazed living room window, put the new box on the truck, finish painting the kitchen ... but none of it ever actually happens.  The living room window is the last one left to be replaced and it's a huge heat sink in the winter.  Combine that with an ancient, huge, loud, clunky, dreadfully inefficient furnace, and it's no wonder our winter gas bills are so high.  Before the suite in the basement was done, we only went downstairs to do laundry or get something from the freezer, so we heated the main floor with the wood stove.  But now we have a tenant, and when a tenant's rent includes heat, we need to provide said heat. Hence the new furnace. 

Thanks to a cold, wet spring that continued right through June and the first half of July, the garden I had such high hopes for is pretty much a wash.  The rhubarb is looking good, and the chives thrive, but I don't think the tomato plants are going to produce much besides leaves.  One planter of strawberries looks promising, but we'll have to figure out a way to keep the birds and squirrels out of it if we're going to get any ripe berries.

But the apple tree!  My lovely, antique Gravenstein apple tree!  It's covered with baby apples  -  the branches are already starting to sag under the weight, and they're still no bigger than golf balls.  If I can keep the local wildlife (and lowlifes) out of that tree, we'll have applesauce and dried apples all winter.  At least, that's the plan.  Meanwhile, I'm going to go baste a blouse and underskirt.

Things I Learned The Hard Way Part Two: Making Things Work

I've often been heard to say, "You don't know what you can do until you don't have a choice."

This applies to many, many different things ... changing a baby, changing a fuse, changing a tire; unclogging a drain or a toilet or a sump pump; putting up curtain rods, light fixtures, wallpaper, shelves; patching a pair of jeans or a sofa or a roof ...  the list is almost endless.

Today, you can find how-to videos on-line on pretty much any subject.  Stores like Home Depot give free lessons in household maintenance and repair.  There are television shows devoted entirely to home maintenance, remodeling, gardening and landscaping, and interior design.  Many public libraries and community centres have free or almost-free classes in numerous subjects from vegetable gardening to fancy lacework to self-publishing.

But it wasn't always so effortless, finding out what you needed to know.

Yes, I learned a lot of skills as a child.  My mother taught me to sew, my father taught me how to use basic hand tools, my great-aunt taught me to knit.  The most important skill they taught me, though, was how to read.  Because that meant that I could read patterns, instructions, how-to manuals, recipes, maps, yellow pages ... which meant that I could figure out how to find out how to do what I needed to do.

After I left home, there weren't many choices when something needed doing; figure it out on my own, get a library book about it, ask someone to show me how to do it, or pay someone else to do it.  And it didn't take long to realize that paying someone else to do it was, in most cases, not an option for me.  I didn't have much money  -  hardly any a lot of the time  -  so either I managed to do whatever it was for myself, or it didn't happen.

There were things nobody ever taught me that I wish they had.  For example, though Mom taught me how to use the sewing machine, I had to figure out for myself how to keep it operating properly.  And while Dad taught me how to use a plunger to unclog a toilet, he never showed me how to replace the float or the flapper valve.  And oddly enough, I was never encouraged to improvise, to use what was available instead of just heading to the hardware store.  So while people might laugh at my early attempts at DIY home repairs, some of them worked pretty well, thank you ...

I have replaced a broken flapper assembly in a toilet with a canning jar lid and a paper clip chain, and replaced a dead float ball and arm with a bent coat hanger, a plastic peanut butter jar, and a bit of modeling clay.  I've built bookcases out of discarded pallets and carefully straightened salvaged nails.  A hairpin is a quick stand-in for a broken cotter pin, and broken cabinet hinges can be replaced with a piece of a worn-out leather belt and some carpet tacks.  I've used two coat hooks to put up a curtain rod cut down from a broken broom handle, and I've used duct tape and cut-up kitchen sponges to replace a fridge gasket.

I've also learned to take advantage of the unexpected ... when a friend presented me with twenty pounds of fresh peaches that wouldn't even fit in my fridge, never mind my teeny-tiny shoebox freezer, I got a library book and some boxes of yard-sale canning jars, borrowed a stockpot, and taught myself to can fruit.  When I was given a wringer washer and a fifty-foot extension cord, I strung the cord back and forth across my little back porch and used it for a clothesline.  The washer lived on the porch, too  -  I filled it with buckets of water hauled from the kitchen sink, and led the drain hose into the storm drain at the bottom of the stairs.  My neighbours thought I was more than a little odd, but I was happy not to be feeding money into the laundromat machines any more.

My mother still doesn't understand why, even though I can now afford to pay to have things done, I still prefer to do them myself.  Maybe it's because she's never had to worry about money the way I have; she never had to choose between feeding the kids and taking the bus instead of walking, she never had to use the washroom at the corner gas station for a week until payday because there was no money for toilet paper.  I don't think she's ever set foot inside a thrift store in her life, or gone to a yard sale or a swap meet, or bought anything from the "day-old" bakery rack.

As strange as it might sound, I don't envy her that financial security.  Yes, being poor can be hard, and yes, it can mean not having a lot of the things other people take for granted.  But it's given me skills and self-awareness and pride in what I've managed to accomplish.  It's given me self-sufficiency, and survival skills, and a deep appreciation for what I do have.

Most of all, it's given me the peace of mind that comes from knowing that no matter what the future may hold, I can deal with it. 

My Silver Linings

In retrospect, my last post ended up being more negative than otherwise.  It happens ... and I'm not going to apologize for it.  This is the one place where I can say exactly what I think and how I feel without being told how /why / to what degree I'm wrong.  That's not to say I feel negative toward my family very often, but when I do, I really don't appreciate having my feelings discounted or pooh-poohed with responses that translate to I'm either crazy, delusional, stupid, or a liar.

And now that I've got that off my chest ...

Last week was super-hairy-crazy-busy-overloaded stressful at work.  To the point where my IBS flared up so badly that by Friday I was spending half the day in the washroom and eating ibuprofen and loperamide like jelly beans.  Well, I knew that this week wouldn't be any better, but I was determined not to let it aggravate my system again.  So today, whenever I felt myself starting to react I just turned my chair around to face away from the desk, took three slow, deep breaths, and told myself not to take it personally.  And it worked!  I felt fine all day, and I still do.  Physically, mentally, emotionally.  So tonight seems like a good time to think about the positives in my life instead of the negatives.

Cloud:  super-hairy-crazy-busy-overloaded days at work.
Silver lining:  a job I love and that I'm really good at (and that incidentally pays pretty well too!).  And every now and them, a client actually expresses appreciation.  It means a lot, folks.  If someone has done a good job for you  -  tell them so!  You'll make their day, I guarantee it.

Cloud:   man and daughters who think they are and will always be my number-one priority.
Silver lining:  man and daughters who are and always will be my number-one priority.

Cloud:  elderly cats who yarf up dead bugs in the living room.
Silver lining:  elderly cats who are still healthy, active, and interested enough to chase and catch the aforementioned bugs.

Cloud:  house that never seems to get clean no matter how much I clean it.
Silver lining:  it's home, and it's mine, and what doesn't get done today will get done another day.  (Besides, cleaning a house with a man living in it is like shoveling the walk while it's still snowing.  And he cooks.)

Cloud:  never enough time or working space to do all the things I want to do.
Silver lining:  I am never bored.  I really mean that. Never.

I may not have achieved as much as some people in worldly or material ways, but I have everything I need, most of what I want, and the freedom to enjoy it.  I have more, in most areas, than ninety-nine per cent of the people on this planet. I have education, security, personal safety and freedoms, health and health care.  I have a roof over my head, suitable clothing for the climate, enough to eat, clean water, reliable transportation, and work that pays a wage I can live on.  What I don't have (except when the IBS is really bad) is any good reason to feel sorry for myself.  Compared to most of the world  -  and any number of people I know  -  I am fortunate.  And, most of the time, grateful.