Cankles, Cellulie and the Dreaded Back Fat…

We are finished with the bedroom remodel. All that remains is to put everything back in the room. In doing so, I tried on all of my clothes before retuning them to my closet. Realizing that most of them don’t even come close to fitting me shook me out of denial.

Today, I start to launch my new lifestyle. For those of you who know me well, you know my weight has been a constant struggle, and likely will remain so.

I have started a weight loss blog at extrapounds.com. A link to this site is posted below my profile. I will write about my weight loss journey at that location, though I will post a weekly update on this blog every Saturday.

Today is July 12, 2008. I weigh 184 pounds. My goal is to weigh 130 pounds by March 11, 2009. I think that to lose 54 pounds in 8 months is a reasonable goal.

Running friends, I’m back…

If You Only Knew The Half Of It…

I have officially been Postmaster of my office for three months today. I haven’t spent a tremendous amount of time there because I have been doing special assignments for my boss in another office.

Yesterday I accompanied one of my carriers on her route. We were chatting and she asked how long I had known my husband before we got married. Three years, I said. I told her that we lived together for two years before the wedding.

She was shocked. She told me that she would have thought that I was an “all or none kind of girl.” The comment wasn’t made in a disapproving way, just as if she couldn’t imagine that I would do something like that.

People form ideas about you based upon what you let them see. I am guilty of doing this. There have been times that I have pegged people as boring and nondescript, only to find out later on that my conclusion was far from reality.

I am all or none, in that I am very decisive. I know what I want from life and I try my hardest to make it happen. I knew I would marry Craig from very early on. Neither of us was refusing to buy the cow. Living together worked at the time, and I wouldn’t change it for a minute.

Sometimes its hard for me to grasp that I am an adult. It seems as if I am still the same person who struggled to find my way from the ages of 18-25. But I am not that girl anymore. When I look at my life, I marvel that I am a wife, homeowner, professional, pet owner, friend, daughter, sister, voracious reader…

Maybe this is as good as it gets. If so, that would be fine with me.

Small Town Living

The deputy police officer mailed his daughter’s photos to Playboy for her. She really wants to be a Bunny. He gives me frequent updates on this. Recently Hef gave her a call. I wish her the best in her future endeavors. But, I still can’t wrap my brain the concept around having your father mail nude photos of you to a men’s magazine. It seems inherently wrong to me.

There is something to be said about having a close relationship with your parents/child, but this may cross the line. But I guess its better than finding out when someone says something like: “Hey, Mike… I saw Sarah in Playboy. She looked smokin hot.”

There is a man in town who comes in every day and buys money orders with cash. Rumor has it he is the town drunk and works odd jobs under the table for cash. When he gets paid he buys money orders so that he can’t spend it all on liquor. I have to respect that he has put some stopgap measure into place to curb his drinking.

Larceny

When I was younger, I had a recurring nightmare.  When I had this dream, I would wake up covered in sweat, unable to shake it from my mind for days. 

 

In the dream, I had successfully shoplifted a bag of jellybeans from Kroger.  After I left with the booty, I felt extremely guilty.  An attempt to return the candy to the shelves was thwarted by a savvy security guard and the police were called.  I was in big trouble. 

 

I have never shoplifted anything.  Intentionally.  When I was in the seventh grade, my dad took me a craft store to purchase some more cross-stitch supplies.  I needed to get some new floss to add to my vast collection.  While at the store, I noticed a small purse sized card listing the numbers of all the DMC floss colors.  It was about 1/8 the size of a piece of paper, printed on card stock and right above the DMC floss display.  I took one and put it in my purse.  A few days later, I noticed that there was a price tag on it that said $.05.  I told my parents about this and begged my dad to take me back to the store so I could pay them.  He said to wait until next time I went.  Several months passed, but I did give them their nickel. 

 

This is the kind of conscience I have when it comes to shoplifting.

 

I am thinking about doing something akin to shoplifting.  Tell me on a scale of 1-10 how immoral this is. 

 

Last July I purchased a clock at a local department store.  It is a very large clock and cost more than $150.  I have had many problems with the clock, as I had to reglue the glass to the metal frame of the clock.  It eats batteries and recently it has stopped working all together. 

 

I do not have my receipt or any type of packaging. 

 

Though this past weekend I noticed they are still selling the same model of clock at this department store.  How bad would it be if I purchased a new clock and then returned the old clock? 

 

Now, that I have written this out, I think I will not do this, as it seems underhanded.  But, a clock that expensive should work for more than a few months.

 

Any ideas?

A scam

I received this curious email recently:

Dear owner of havebeenchanged.blogspot.com,
I noticed that your blog “havebeenchanged.blogspot.com” hasn’t been updated for a while. I’d like to buy this blog.
I assume that you are not interested in running it anymore.
I can buy this blog for $150.
What do you think?
Stan Nonin,stan.nonin@blueridgehosting.com

For those of you who didn’t know, I previously blogged at Names Have Been Changed. I lost interest in blogging for a while and when I resumed blogging I started Mistress of the Post.

This offer raises many questions. What would they do with the website? How would they pay me? Would they be purchasing my old posts? How would they login?

I am not sure if this is a scam. If so, I’m not sure what the scam is. Any ideas?

I’m a Rotarian

Postmasters are expected to join a community organization. So, its official… I’m now a Rotarian.

I have been to two meetings. The first one was about the town’s sewer system. The person who gave the presentation was very interested in sewers (that made one person in the room). After that I wasn’t sure…

Today’s meeting was presented by a nurse from the Illinois Board of Health. She talked about prairie medicine used 150 years ago versus today’s medicine.

Need a cure for that bothersome sty? Just wipe it with a urine-soaked baby diaper!

Small open wound? Pee on it and then cover it with bacon!

Large gaping open wound? Cover it with leftover mashed potatoes!

Ear infection? Put urine in the ear or blow smoke into it! My mother actually did blow smoke in my ears when I was in junior high or high school and was suffering for a year-long ear infection. I mentioned this to her today and she denied it vehemently.

My mother was a chain-smoker for years. She quit cold turkey about fifteen years ago. Both of my parents smoked so much that when I was in grade school teachers and parents asked me if I smoked. When my friend Melissa came to our house, she had to put everything she brought with her in her basement when she got home. Now my parents home smells very nice, but that doesn’t cancel out the truth that smoke was blown into my ears (and this wasn’t on the prairie my friends, since I am 30 years old).

Living in a veritable disaster zone

The store manager of Lowe’s was very helpful. They gave me my money back for the paint and then gave me two new gallons of paint so we can fix the room. I’m glad. I really like Lowe’s and didn’t want to have to boycott them.

We just moved to this house during Memorial Day weekend 2007. I am amazed at the amount of stuff we have accumulated during that time. We took everything out of our bedroom so that we could work on the floor and now the other three bedrooms and hallway are unnavigable.

We have a large storage room in our basement. It is so full that you can’t walk. We bought a large shelving unit at Menard’s yesterday and I put it together (all by myself! – I am pretty pleased that I did this). I took everything out of the room and put it in our family room. Right now, I am taking a break from putting everything back.

Our house looks like we just moved in! It’s going to drive me insane.

Our neighborhood is having a garage sale soon, I will definitely be participating.

When Purchasing more than one gallon of the same color of paint, make sure your base paint is the same

We are spending this 4th of July weekend remodeling our bedroom. We have already painted the room and will proceed to removing the carpet and installing wood laminate floor. Hopefully it will look nice.

We have already encountered a big snafu, which I was absolutely FUMING about yesterday. We went to Lowe’s on Big Hollow Road last Sunday and spent over $400. Two gallons of paint cost $50. We selected our paint color and took the card to the woman mixing the paint. She gave us our two gallons and we were on our merry way.

We started painting Sunday because we wanted to devote the three day weekend entirely to installing the floor. We got most of the room done, but didn’t get to finish it until Wednesday evening.

We noticed the second gallon of paint was going on a bit lighter, but figured it would dry darker, after all shouldn’t we be able to trust that Lowe’s actually gave us what we paid for? Wrong! It dried a lot lighter! And since we used it to touch up around the room it looks crazy.

I called Lowe’s yesterday and talked to a manager. At first he told me that there could be no difference since the paint is mixed by machine. I invited him to my home for a look-see. He then asked me to look on the paint can to see if the base paints were different. Bingo. Satin Base 1 for the one can and Satin Base 2 for the other. He said they could replace one of the cans for us. So now I have to take my time to go to Lowe’s for them to give me new paint, when they should have done it right in the first place.

The manager I spoke to was very lackadaisical about this and acted as if it was not a big deal at all.

What about our time? It will take an estimated 5 hours to fix this! We should be able to trust Lowe’s to mix paint properly for us. It was not a complicated order. This is their error and I think they should step up to the plate and act like they care. Whenever customers call me to complain about their mail service, I am very sympathetic to their problem and do my best to assist them.

I am going in to talk to the store manager in a minute…

Mrs Moneypenny battles the bear market

After I made a mental inventory of the things I do to save money, I felt good about myself. Then I was struck by all of the counteractive things I do to waste money. Woe is me.

Here is my list of savings:
1. We have the $13 cable. You get channels 2-22. I watch very little television (1-2 hours per week) so this is really only a sacrifice on my husband’s part. Right now he is thinking about getting a flat screen TV. He says the $13 cable will still be good enough, but I beg to differ. The next tier of cable is in the mid $50 range.

2. I check out my books from the library. I used to spend at least $100/month at Borders, so this makes a a big impact. By the way, I am very excited that the Peoria Public library decided to build behind Menard’s. This is really close to my house, but PLEASE give me a light at the corner of Allen and Alta!

3. I only get the newspaper on Sundays. I used to get it everyday, but they would pile up. I can’t give up Sundays because I really like to peruse the wedding and birth announcements and get a great kick out of reading the real estate transactions.

4. When I’m at the store, I always get the best value of whatever product it is I’m purchasing. I buy generic as much as possible. I am known for my love of Diet Dr. Thunder. You can’t beat $.67 for a 2 liter or $2.56 for a 12 pack. It was slightly embarrassing carrying the generic can around at first, but I got used to it. I am saving a lot of money towards my cats’ future, a’la Leona Helmsley.

5. I have tried hyper-miling, and at this point could be saving upwards of $5 a week by incorporating my new (safety first) driving techniques. I drive 100 miles round-trip each day, so $5 is not much in the grand scheme of things!

Here are a few things I do to waste money:
1. We eat out A LOT! We could save a lot of money by cooking at home.

2. I often purchase food items and throw 1/2 to 3/4 of the container away because I can’t trust myself to not eat the entire thing. Many pints of Caramel Sutra have found their way into the garbage at my house.

3. I buy bottled water. I should just buy a container and refill it. I often intend to do something like this. I buy the container, use it for a few days and then lose it.

4. My husband made me let our cleaning lady go. She charged $75 every other week and was not doing a good job. For example several times she left notes saying that our vacuum was broken and wouldn’t suck anything up. We checked it out and it just needed emptied! I am in fierce negotiations to get her back. I don’t like to clean!

I am going to try to change a few of these bad habits and think of a few more frugal living ideas.

Holocaust

I have always been intrigued by the Holocaust. Last year my husband and I traveled to Washington DC and our first day was spent at The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. The vast amount of information that is presented at the Museum is overstimulating. There is room for no other senses or emotions when one leaves. Especially striking is the shoe exhibit, a pile of shoes that were removed by victims of the gas chamber prior to entry.

An avid reader, I have read many Holocaust memoirs. The earliest one I recall and the one that has stuck with me the most was Alicia: My Story by Alicia Appleman-Jurman. In fact, Alicia Appleman-Jurman is the only author I have ever written to. She sent me an autographed copy of her book in response. This is one of my few treasures, a book I first discovered in junior high school and have returned to again and again. It is inscribed:

To Dear Laura, a very special lady,
A tragic page in history was written for my generation. God willing, you will write your page with happiness, love, Shalom and a celebration of human dignity.
With all my love,
Alicia Appleman-Jurman

I echo her sentiments for this generation. It is unconscionable that such horrors befell people during the Holocaust. I cannot imagine living my life in such a manner and I certainly hope never to have to. I hope that the people that have told their story have given enough of themselves to let the world know that such an event can not happen again. Knowledge is power.

In the past month, I have stumbled across three wonderful books that are set around the Holocaust. Reviews of these books will follow in the next few days.