Friday…again! How does that happen? I’d swear yesterday was last Saturday.
LOL! It really is true that the older you get, the faster time goes by. Presumably that’s because you have less and less of it available. All told.
Finished another half-dozen chapters of a client’s novel this a.m. Bid on another Chinese scholarly work but, not having heard back, assume my price was too high. Oh well…that frees up some time to…oh…breathe.
Or run down to the gas station. Used up the few dollars’ worth of QT gas I bought when I dodged the poor crazy guy at the Costco gas pumps ten days ago, so decided to make another run down there. No pests or freaks in evidence this time.
Price was five cents a gallon under QT’s. I pumped about 12 gallons, for a gigantic saving of 60 cents… This again raises the question, Why am I paying to shop at Costco?
With fuel prices this low, there’s not a lot of difference between retailers. And five cents a gallon doesn’t pay for the time involved in driving down there, since there’s a QT right around the corner from the ’hood. I begin to wonder if it would be practical to drop my membership and pay half my son’s, so as to sponge on his to buy the few things I really do need or want to get there. This would cut both our membership bills in half, in exchange for a minor once-a-month inconvenience.
Really, I’m amazed at how little interest I feel in shopping at Costco, given that before the Citigroup disruption it was my mainstay. Meh!
Gerardo repaired the irrigation leak, to the tune of $180. When his men dug up the pipe, they found that Richard’s guys apparently had not applied adhesive to the threading on the PVC pipe’s connection to the equipment in the front-yard box. Gerardo thinks it had been leaking for a long time.
Ducky. Since that spot is right next to the house’s foundation, I do hope he’s wrong. But find, alas, that Gerardo is rarely wrong.
The weather is beginning to cool. We had a beautiful morning, after a brief sprinkle and distant thunder. The clouds cleared off. With the dogs sleeping through the heat of the day, I snuck into the backyard and left them trapped inside the house, so I could take a plunge in the pool without being barked into submission.
Herding dogs do not like it when their sheep humans jump in the drink.
They assume, of course, that you’re not too bright and so no doubt fell in, and they’re convinced you’re going to drown yourself. Cassie, who has enough sense not to jump in the pool, used to race back and forth trying to bark me out of the pool. When the devil-may-care Ruby came along, I had to build a little fence to keep her from tumbling into the drink. She, having taking over barking duties from the old lady, stands by the gate and yells at me from the minute I get in to the minute I climb out.
This does nothing to enhance one’s enjoyment of one’s swimming pool. So…it was pleasant to have tricked them this afternoon.
And now, speaking of tricked, the would-be next client has replied to my email without answering any of my questions. I think we have a language issue here.
😀
And so, away…
I used to have a Tonkinese cat that would meow at me from the moment I sat down in a tub to the moment I got out. Good thing I took showers 99% of the time. These days, I can’t even afford a goldfish (not that I’d want one), so don’t have to worry about stressing out pets.
I gave up my Costco membership a while ago. Factoring in the annual membership fee, I wasn’t saving any money on what I bought there. Also, given my weekly grocery budget is $30 while I’m unemployed there’s not much of anything there I could buy. Now pretty much just shop at Walmart. I’ve found if you go around 7:30 – 8am the experience isn’t as bad (still not great by any stretch of the imagination).
I hope I’ll find work soon so that we can go back to living and not simply surviving, but that hope is quickly fading. I spent $1,000 (2/3 of what it costs to live for a month) getting to/from what was supposed to be final meet and greet and job offer negotiation for a good paying job only for the company to pull funding for the role while I was there.
ohhh god! That’s awful! I would have asked them to please pay for the out-of-pocket costs. But…I’m nervy.
Speaking of Costco, have you looked at CC as a place to work? When I was first laid off, not one, not two, but THREE Costco employees urged me to apply for a job, any job there and try to work up to something comparable to what I was doing. Weirdly, Costco employees LIKE their jobs.
That’s worth a lot, right there…
Also, back in those fun times, a woman at the Social Security office suggested I apply to the federal government, which hires people in virtually ALL lines of work. She liked her job, too: said the benefits can’t be beat, the working conditions are acceptable, and you get generous time off.
And having worked for the state, I’ll say a state job is usually a pretty good gig, too. What you lack in pay there, you make up in job security, leave time, and benefits.
It IS funny the way gas prices dictate where we buy gas. I have witnessed folks crossing 3 lanes of traffic for cheap gas. We tend to buy our gas at the local guy’s place unless we have a large “rewards” balance at the JUMBO grocery store. Due to the fact I shop there about every 6 weeks…..not a lot of gas rewards lately. Our guy is competitive and once when the wife locked her keys in the car he showed up and got her in the car. ….AND wouldn’t take any money….TRUE STORY. Sooo she buys ALL her gas there and I buy MOST of my gas there. He’s a great guy….
As for the Costco shopping….I was never a Costco member BUT I can relate a bit with my visits to the HUGE grocery store. I used to go EVERY week and drop about $100 to $125….Then I discovered Aldi and I tend to go to the big store every 6-8 weeks. And when Aldi began accepting credit cards….Nirvana…. as I receive 6% rewards on groceries. I find the HUGE GC less and less enjoyable even though I don’t go as much. When I go in I see …”a lot of choices”….and “a lot of overhead”….and HIGHER PRICES. Because I don’t go as often I tend to notice the price jumps more then when I went every week. AND we don’t seem to notice any change in our food inventory or meals because of the change in shopping habits….Where was that $100 a week going?
AND it’s pretty much official the garden has been deemed a success. The “harvest” is in full swing and the tomatoes and squash are wonderful. No more $1 tomatoes for DW from the “fruit stand” as we have PLENTY. We had BLT’s last night and the tomato slices hung OVER the bread…DW used to “drop” $5-$10 every week for …”GOOD” tomatoes and produce at the local stand…no more…It’s almost time to put in another bit of lettuce in the planters when/if it cools down. This too has been a success BUT the heat is very hard on lettuce. And I have to begin saving seeds for next years “production”.