The Living Without Series
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Hi, April here. You all have no idea the monster that was created when you left comments to Clay’s posts when I was at camp and unable to blog on a regular basis. Now he thinks he needs to write all of the stories I’ve heard nine billion times for the whole world to hear. The man really is a good story teller. One of his fellow architect buddies once said to him, “Clay, you have a funny $##! story for EVERYTHING!” and it’s true. I felt I should share this side of my life with you so that you too can enjoy the Clay stories, but honestly, it’s the best when you hear them in person, because there are lots of sound effects, facial expressions and awkward body gestures that accompany the tale. Click here to read his other posts and enjoy this latest installment.
Gary, Todd, and I planned a driving trip to a brand new water park about an hour and a half north of our town and about 20 minutes west of Hannibal, Missouri.
Who is Todd you ask? He was, and still is, the third member of the Gary, Clay, and Todd trio. Todd started hanging out with Gary and me just before the seventh grade, mostly because he played D&D and I was really into it. Yes, I said D&D. My name is Clay, I’m a huge dork and my 13th level Ranger can kick your butt. Just so you have a picture, Todd is 6’-1” and around 250 pounds and considers April Fool’s Day his favorite holiday. I’m not kidding, he gave a speech on it in English class. He also gave a speech on the proper tying of knots and included the whole class. They loved it. I once gave a speech on shoving a stick in my eye while the entire class looked shocked and horrified. Todd’s speeches were much better.
It was Todd’s idea to drive up to this water park, spend the day frolicking around in a wave pool and water slides and then come home and enjoy the memories. It was Gary’s idea to have his Dad call AAA and get a TripTick. I didn’t have any ideas so I was told to ask my Dad if we could borrow the car.
Asking for the car was going to be a big, big challenge. I had used the car, a red AMC Concord, several days before to drive the three of us to the IGA to grab some stuff. This was just after Dad had finished cleaning my clock with a mighty tongue lashing. I’m sure it had something to do with his desk lamp and how I was to be very careful so that it didn’t break. Anyway, I was upset when I left the house. I climbed into the Concord and drove across the street to Gary’s place.
Gary’s driveway was a single lane wide with two enormous bushes on either side of the street. So if you wanted to get out of the car you had to drive completely into the driveway so that you were past the bushes, or you had to stop short of the bushes with the rear end of the car sticking out into the street. On this day, I pulled all the way in.
Todd climbed into the back seat, Gary got into the passenger side and I started pulling out of the driveway. But I was still preoccupied with Dad’s “conversation” and started to pull out before Gary shut the door. He started yelling “Clay…Clay…CLAY CLAY CLAY!!” while I was zoned out and thinking about all of the clever things I should have said. The first noise I heard was of wrenching metal, a prolonged screech and crumple. I got out of the car and went around to the passenger side. The door, Gary’s door, was laying flat against the front fender because I had backed it over the bushes, Gary’s bushes. It was still on its hinges, but now it was pushed all the way to the front. We looked it over for a second and with a monumental heave that you only read about in posts, the three of us pushed it back into place. It never, ever opened again.
One more thing you should know, the heater on the Concord, through no fault of my own, was stuck on. Always. No matter the outside temperature, it was always a boiling 98 degrees inside. You could usually alleviate the blast furnace effect by rolling down the window on the passenger side…but, um, that was now out of the question. So really, I didn’t ask Dad if I could borrow the car, I asked him if I could take the rolling kiln for a spin. Dad said yes.
We prepared ourselves for the trip and set out on probably the hottest day that summer…
Remember when I told you about the real chicken farmers, Tim and Diane? In that post you can see a photo of one of their gardens. Tim and Diane sell fresh eggs and garden produce. Every spring and summer they send out an email for people to sign up to be a garden pal. You can pay for the produce or you can barter with them. They have a list of services and items that they are willing to barter for their produce and eggs. I love this way of exchanging things people need. Tim and Diane were wanting organic pork and guess who has a whole bunch of that growing in her back yard? Me!
Since I grow my own garden I made arrangements with Tim and Dian to receive some of their produce and large batches of things like broccoli, peas and beans that I can ‘put up’.
I gave up on growing broccoli last year after I served a lovely pasta dish to my family complete with lots of little worms. We had all eaten several heaping mouth fulls of the stuff when my daughter held up her fork and calmly asked,
“Um, Mom? What is this?” It was a worm. I thought I had washed all of them out of the broccoli, but apparently they were hiding deep in the florets. That was the end of dinner…..and my broccoli growing.
Tim and Diane start their broccoli very early, before it should be planted and force it up by using thermal insulation better known as black plastic. Their broccoli is ready to harvest before the cabbage worms have time to take over and therefore they avoid Pasta Con Wormy.
Putting up broccoli is so easy, but it does make the house stink like, um, well broccoli which if you’ve ever made broccoli cheddar soup and stuck the leftovers in the fridge you know that after a day it smells a bit like someone crawled in there and took a crap.
Directions for Puttin’ Up Some Dat Broccoli
Take your broccoli and cut it down the stalk or into small florets, it’s up to you. I did some small florets in one bag and longer spears in another.
Set a large pot of water on to boil.
Fill a large bowl with ice water.
Have good freezer bags available and a sharpie to label them, do a couple before you start (I always forget to do this or I don’t label at all and then regret it later. Don’t be like me.)
Place the broccoli in the boiling water just long enough to blanch it. Like 30 seconds to a minute, you want to keep it bright green. Spoon out the broccoli and place immediatley into the ice bath, this stops the cooking and makes it easier to freeze.
Did I forget to tell you to have a colander handy? You’ll need one, stick it in the sink.
Dump the iced broccoli into the colander and let the water drain off.
Here’s the hard part, listen carefully…..place the broccoli in a freezer bag. Put the bag of broccoli in the freezer. Did you label it? Please label it, and when you are done come over to my house and label mine. Thank you.
Are there any questions? I know this was really hard. Study your notes there will be a test next week.
I haven’t written about our debt situation for quite a while. So, let’s get you all up to speed. It’s hard. The end.
Just kiddin’. No really, it’s hard and it may never, ever, ever end. Excuse me while I collapse into a heap of snot filled tissues for a moment.
And I’m back.
Thank you for coming along on my daily “Bouncing Back” adventure ride, please watch your step as you exit the gate, it needs repaired and I’ll be dipping into my DAMN RAMSEY emergency fund to fix it!
I have to agree with that Damn Ramsey guy when he talks about having an emergency fund in place. If you don’t, Murphy (as in Murphy’s Law) is going to come knocking on the door and when you let him in he is going to leave a devastating path of destruction that will suck every dime out of your pocket. We have had all the Murphy that we can stand this year. We’ve had to rebuild our emergency fund which is $1000 four times. FOUR TIMES!!! It’s painful, but I am so glad we have that chunk set aside for stupid things like the truck needing repairs, the furnace dying, the well pump breathing its last breath, the van needing all new rotars and break pads and the truck having sympathy for the van and deciding it needed new rotars and break pads too, bless it’s heart.
$1000, by the way is not enough for us. We are trying to bump it up to $1500 and then eventually to $2000, but we keep needing to use it, so who knows if that will ever happen. DAMN RAMSEY!
For the last four or six or eight months, really who’s counting? Anyway, the economy has not helped us one lick this last year and I’m sure there are many of you that have felt the sting a bit or a lot. The company profit shares that we had been hoping to take a chunk out of our debt were not coming through and we found ourselves stuck in the mud not sinking, but not able to get anywhere. Lots of dings to our emergency fund happened and we felt dehydrated and frustrated, but not completely hopeless. Which when your getting out of debt feeling hopeless is not going to enable you to put on your fightin’ gloves.
Time for Mamma to get a job!
I feel the need to explain that deep down, I’m a working girl. In August Clay and I will celebrate 18 years of marriage and I’ve only been unemployed for a little over two of those. Being a mom is my first priority, so my jobs have always been something I could either do from home or work around Clay’s schedule so that one of us could be with the children. I function at a much higher rate of insanity….I mean…sanity when I have something outside my home to keep me accountable for my time and energy. Does that sound weird? It’s okay, I’m weird, so it makes sense.
The “Mom” jobs that I’ve had in the past have strangely come to me by way of circumstance and mishap. I got into church finance because I was talking to the gentleman that was doing the job at my church and he took that as me being interested. Before I knew it he was training me to take over for him so he could retire. When we moved to St. Louis the church financial secretary stepped down from the church we had been attending for less than a year and wah-la I had another church finance job. I was able to do that work from home while I homeschooled and gave birth to two babies. It was a bit crazy at times, but it was a great job.
I’ve done a bit of catering and I’m by no means a caterer. I decided it would be fun to combine a wine tasting with some yummy appetizers for our school auction. So, I asked a local winery if they would host the tasting and I would provide the food. That led to the owner of the winery thinking I cook for a living and I’ve had two little jobs because of that. I don’t think I’ll ever promote myself in the cooking arena, but it’s fun to do every now and then and I’ll keep offering the wine tastings as an auction item.
What is my new job? Does it have to do with finances? Yes. Does it have to do with food? No, not really. But, it does have a lot to do with event planning. And I love to plan events and parties. Especially when the event is for a good cause.
I applied for the job of Development Director for my children’s small school. I had thought about the postition when it was first announced and had hoped and prayed that the school would be able to find someone that had a heart for building up the school. When nobody stepped forward I found out that the board had approached a woman that I had a brief working relationship with on another volunteer job earlier in the year. I was so impressed with this woman, she’s pretty much the exact opposite of me. Let’s just say she plays golf and runs marathons. You see the difference right? I really like her because she gets things done and she’s super sweet about it. I had heard that she didn’t want to take on the job full-time. That’s when a huge siren went off in my head and I picked up the phone and called her. I asked her if she would want to apply for the job together and we could share the responsibilities. I could focus on the big events that help raise funds for the school and she could do the marketing and together we would form one full time Development Director. Now of course there is a lot more to the job than the events and marketing, but I don’t want to bore you.
So I have a new job! I’m very excited about it. I’m able to do the bulk of it from home where I’m still needed…..to clean the bathrooms. And now we can get moving a bit on that debt thing. I’m doing something I enjoy. It will be stressful and demanding at times, but so are my kids and I still love them. Kids are the best job I’ve ever had, so I can compare them a little bit. Right? Really, the best thing is that I’m working on something that benefits my children and other people and GETTING PAID FOR IT!
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