March 15, 2009
After the hike yesterday, my joints are rather sore and I’m in need of some resting up to head off a major ‘ritis flare-up. Therefore, health day!
The shoulder has been out of whack for a long time, so I’m getting that worked on today. We’ll have a late lunch of cheese pizza and salad, and catch up with some old friends.
The Futility Fund (administered by Vanguard) was infused with the Rollover Contribution, finally. That’s $800+ down that drain. š
I’m still waiting for that last insurance reimbursement check from the credit card company, though. Should call and find out what’s taking them s’darned long this time.
Hope everyone else is having a fabulous day!
March 8, 2009
Shouldn’t be bloggin’, I know, it’s just boring waiting for Shutterfly to upload the darned pictures.
The shower went off swimmingly, I think, but I couldn’t tell from the vantage point of organizing and decorating and shuttling gifts.
She got some really cool stuff, like two Boppy pillows. She can stack them for sleeping “on” her stomach, or tall folks can stack ’em when they hold the baby.
I’m so glad a girlfriend prebaked a batch of cupcakes, everyone decorated a few and ate most of the rest. There won’t be any left for the dudes who’ll be coming back from their Man Expedition, but that’s just too bad!
I hope everyone else had a great Sunday! I’m ready for a nap.
September 15, 2008
I put all other stressful parts of my life on hold yesterday starting at 2 pm. I didn’t take work with me, as I always do “in case of down time,” and I resolved not to even worry about getting back in time to put in another two hours of work. I was going to spend time with friends, end of story.
It was amazing.
I had organized a mini-massage day at a girlfriend’s house since we sickies were in sore need. My masseuse friend was happy to make a house call for me and two other friends, and a fourth came over just to spend time with us because she couldn’t afford the massage. She was recently laid off due to governmental budget cuts, so hosting friend and I agreed to split the cost of her massage to treat her.
At $40/hour, it was the right thing to do: she’s been searching for a job since July, on unemployment, and I could swing half the cost, as could hosting friend.
All in all, masseuse friend worked for four hours, with a nice break in between, so I know that helped her financially. I got to catch up with masseuse friend during my massage, we spoiled four hung out, chatted, ate Godiva chocolates and potatos chips and watched football. And a LOT of Food Network. Did you know that Alton Brown has yet another “Feasting on …” show? And I finally saw Dinner Impossible.
After the massages, we had an impromptu pizza party, AND I made use of hosting friend’s multifunction, multipage scanner to scan two inches worth of auto insurance and Rollover IRA documents. Which, I hasten to add, was not work, it was organizational and I loooove organizing. It’s good for my soul. As are good friends, massages, chocolate, potato chips, and maybe one less slice of pizza for dinner. Four slices of Pizza Hut pizza plus honey barbeque wings were, perhaps, a bit much.
Massage, mine: $40 (I’m not allowed to tip, masseuse friend scolds me when I do)
Massage, friend: $25
Pizza/wings: $6
Scanning services: 1000 calories burnt, running up and down the stairs from scanner to computer
Total: $71
Lucky me, the massages will come out of my FSA/medical account, so I don’t even have to feel guilty. And coming home without a single nagging bit of guilt about how much work I didn’t get done that day? Priceless.
I hope everyone had a great weekend! And if not this past weekend, then this next one!
July 24, 2008
The lock on my driver’s side has been malfunctioning on and off, more on lately than off, over the past month. It doesn’t respond to the remote when I arm the alarm, so I hear a quiet little *thunk* …. *thunk*….. *thunk* as the door tries to lock in order before arming the alarm. Since it can’t quite make it, the alarm is never properly armed, so I have to manually lock and unlock that door in order to use the remote alarm.
It’s mostly inconvenient, but when I’m busy and in a hurry, I don’t want to forget and rush off leaving my baby unprotected! A family friend promised to come over and teach me how to diagnose and fix the problem, but it’s been two weeks and the man still hasn’t called or shown up, so I’ve asked a good friend to help me out.
He thinks he knows what’s wrong with it, but I’m going to put it through a field test to be sure of exactly what does and doesn’t work before I go spending money on it. With any luck, it’s just the one lock unit that will have to be replaced, and he can help me install it. In the meantime, I’ve found a couple car enthusiast forums with huge lists of installation guides, and am hoping to learn some car savviness, wish me luck!
July 12, 2008
Ho boy. If this is how tired I am after a night and afternoon of socializing, I’m going to be in trouble at the end of this month when I’m going to be on the road for 8 days. I’m an inveterate correspondent, and I don’t even want to look at emails I intended to respond to, today. That’s how tired I am. My brain is *done* with talking to people. Well, why are you posting? you ask? Because you’re not just any people, you’re MY people. š
A girlfriend was back in town last night, and I haven’t seen her since the wedding in January when we certainly didn’t get a chance to really socialize at all. She invited everyone over to dinner, and five of us sat down to the most amazing home cooked dinner ever. When did we grow up and when did she learn to set a table like that??? It was in-cred-i-ble!!!
Picture this:
A platter of sliced beef, brisket style.
Baked beans in lightly spiced barbeque sauce.
Perfectly crisp green beans.
Fresh, crisp, sliced cucumbers, with a squeeze of lemon and dash of salt.
Ripe, red, succulent tomatoes.
Roasted baby potatoes.
Freshly baked, made from scratch, apple tart, with homemade bechamel sauce.
Heaven. Sheer gastronomic heaven. Everything was fresh, picked from the garden or from the farmer’s market. I made a total pig of myself, and doubled up on helpings of everything. And there were still leftovers! We had a red wine from Paso Robles, and an Australian white. Seriously, it’s one thing to pretend I’m an adult and drink wine with the grown-ups at work functions, but there’s something strikingly poignant about realizing that we were staging our very own dinner party. Nothing so formal and constrained as one with place cards and hostess gifts and such, but still the real deal. Conversation went ’round and ’round the table, taking everyone in turn, telling our stories, catching up on lives. There was a lot of love and a whole lot more laughter as everyone gave everyone else a hard time. It’s comforting to know that there are still relationships that are just easy after so many years.
Then, today, we had our little college reunion lunch. The college pal that I kept in touch with and I were kicking around ideas a few months ago and I proposed that we get the old gang together. It took a lot of coordination and calls, but we pulled it together and got six of our nine intended guests to show up for lunch today. Actually, that sounds like they weren’t interested, but I think everyone was happy that we’d put this together. I think it was quite a success: we laughed and talked for FOUR HOURS. We never even got around to catching up, we were just enjoying each others’ company and telling funny stories and picking on one another like the old days. It felt like hardly a day had passed since we graduated four years ago. Everyone’s changed a little. I could see it. We aren’t those gangly 20-year-olds anymore, and there was some complexity in their eyes, some sadness that wasn’t shared, and a little tentativeness that was only mostly covered up by banter. I think we’d all forgotten what it was like to have fun, just stupid, loud, dumb, funny, gratuitous fun. That might be why we were just happy to be together, and we’ll be doing it again.
If only I weren’t so busy for the next several weeks…. but I’m going to be out of town or otherwise engaged every weekend from next weekend through the end of August. Eeep! My schedule is actually pretty daunting, but I plan to milk it for all I can. Who knows how much longer I’ll be in the area or have a stable income from this job! Oh, don’t worry, I’m not trying to spend it all now or anything, I just want to reconnect to people and remember what it’s like to have a life. It’s going to be important to find that confidence again for interviews and finding a new job!
Anyway, I found myself unable to keep my eyes open after I finally got home after 4 pm. Eventually I caved to the inevitable and just napped. Mmmm…sleep….
June 19, 2008
Walking out the door, I caught myself glancing at my closet and assessing what kind of day it would be, and what outfits I could put together for the rest of the week. It seems my lunch organization is bleeding into other areas of my life.
It also seems like after being on a spending and splurging cycle for the last three weeks where I couldn’t stop the budget bleeding out on little things I’d normally control very carefully, I’m back to being content with what I’ve got, and even in the mood to go through and clear things out. Thank goodness!! I’m not into self-flagellation over this stuff, but it’s such a relief to be back in the right mindset that doesn’t undermine my efforts to keep it together.
While my personal damages weren’t on a large scale, it definitely turned into a hefty bill when combined with the insane gas prices. I think the gas expenditures have gone up to about $300+/month! I’ve been diligently trying to reduce other fixed costs to compensate, but I’ve been spending like I have money: going out, the trench coat ($23), going out to lunch last weekend ($10), new shoes ($11), buying a graduation gift for a work friend ($24), and having to give my cousin a fat $50 check for graduation. In short, enjoying life a liiiiitle more than I can afford.
Ok, that last one was not negotiable, I’m the only cousin who came to the graduation and it’s only fair that I give him what I gave his sister. It’s a family tradition that at least one older cousin will gift the younger cousins a check for their graduations.
It might not seem like much, but when the budget’s stretched tight, it makes a difference. The end of the splurge cycle comes none too soon, because I hate the feeling of treading to keep my head above water.
I had to wonder, why is it so hard for someone who is normally so at peace with being frugal to break out of a spending/splurging mentality? Sure, I figured it was temporary, but heck, I felt like I was in the grips of a six armed bear for a while! I knew I needed to NOT spend money, but there was always a reason that overrode my “Uh, well, you don’t have the budget for that …” hesitation.
And if it’s this hard for me? When I’m accustomed to self denial and maximizing returns and stretching every resource to cover the necessities? Heck, I spent half an hour deciding whether or not to get a haircut this week. Then I realized that after spending over a hundred dollars I shouldn’t have, I should pass on my $14 cut. *sigh* How incredibly hard must it be for people who haven’t had to practice this?
April 28, 2008
Every so often, I forget that I’m writing a PF blog, and completely leave out the financial aspects of whatever I’m posting about. Sometimes, it just doesn’t occur to me, and it seems like a fine thing not to be obsessed about the money instead of the experience.
But, this is a PF blog, and I’d be remiss in skipping over the costs of the weekend, few though they were.
Gas: $58, round trip. I still had a quarter tank of gas left, so it wasn’t quite the whole $58 for the trip. Thank goodness my car gets great gas mileage! BF even insisted on giving me some gas money, but we’re to consider it a deposit on the next trip up š They’re so weird.
Meals: $1. Saturday’s dinner and Sunday’s lunch were BF’s husband’s treats, and I threw in a supplemental tip but that’s all I was allowed. Breakfast was muffins and cake at home.
Beach: $0. Parking cost a couple of quarters since we got a late start on Saturday. There weren’t any beach fees, and the tidepool beach was free on Sunday as well.
Movie: $0. We watched a DVD they already had, and have a few more movies lined up for my next few visits.
Snacks: $0. We brought our own water and granola bars, but were having enough fun, and it was cold enough, that we didn’t even need them.
Souvenirs: $0. Didn’t need to buy a darn thing. I did pass several really nice outlets on the drive … but that’ll be for some other trip, some other time. It’s such a long drive that all I wanted to do was get to their house to hang out, and then get home the next day. Stopping to go shopping doesn’t sound appealing in the least.
All told, the weekend was plenty cheap and totally worth the gas money.
