Sunday
Grocery shopping day. This time three weeks of supplies for $100, including stocking up on Coke while it was on sale ($.40 for each 20-ounce bottle, $.25 a can -- it pays to use the stock from home and forgo machines and restaurant Cokes!). Now that I've been in this new routine of grocery shopping for about three months, I'm really impressed by some changes. The first two trips were mega excursions -- I think that was a combination of getting into a new routine, learning where the staples are in all my local stores (Sam's, particularly), and stocking up on sometimes items like paper goods. Each trip since then has gotten progressively quicker. Now I probably spend less time doing three week's worth of shopping on a weekend day than I used to spend doing one week's worth every single week. Needless to say, I'm saving mad dough on this -- $100-$150 every three weeks versus $75-$100 every week? Oh yeah. The funny thing is that we're actually getting much more for less money, too. Obviously I think this new routine is successful.
Now to tackle another good habit that we need to make: Recycling! I bought a special trashcan for our recyclable goods. I checked at the drop-off at the library what we can recycle. For us, it'll probably be just soft drink containers and maybe the occasional plastic food container. Since I have never been in the habit of recycling in my life, I have no sense whatsoever of what comes packaged in #1 or #2 plastics which are what our city recycles. This will be a learning process -- but an important one. There really never was much excuse for not doing it, so it's time has long since come.
Checked at Wal-Mart for a small heating pad to keep beneath my Tempurpedic pillow this winter since traditionally it freezes like a bag of concrete when it's cold and I have to change pillows in wintertime. No small heating pads. So I checked twin size electric blankets -- $89.95?! Are you kidding me?? Srsly. When did a twin size electric blanket go past $40?? (Uh, 1974, probably.) I did see that they have heated mattress pads -- oh, what a luxury that must be! Ian would never stand for it, however, and really I have to admit that it makes little sense in anything but a super cold climate. Dallas, Texas hardly qualifies.
Ian (and some of the other artists) got an exciting inquiry from BioWare-Austin to do temp work on Star Wars. He'll interview and hear out their offer. It's a 9-12 month contract position for a comparatively low hourly wage. Security is really important to Ian, so he's particularly concerned about the temporary nature of it. Understandably he'll have questions about the potential for the position to be picked up permanently. On the other hand, the insecurity of contract work wouldn't be so bad if the money were good. Having BioWare and this project as the first line on his resume would be very cool... but we're looking to have a baby next year. And really, with me looking down the barrel of 38, we're getting toward the "now or never" stage of things. Having him doing temp work, AND low on the money during a bad economy just not ideal for this particularly year. If Ian were single, or I were his age, we'd be packing our bags to move to Austin now. Things are what they are, however. Still, it's a great honor to be contacted, and certainly worth investigation.
The BioWare email spawned a good discussion yesterday over lunch about our order of priorities and favorite potential jobs right now: This is the Family list, this is the Financial list, Ian's Profession list, Ian's personal, and my personal. We went over our reasons for each placement. It was a good talk -- good to just "touch base" and learn that we really are on the same page with things right now. Previously I had the impression that Ian was so gung-ho about his career at this moment that finding the right professional opportunity was #1 to him no matter what. It did my heart glad to know that given my age and the timing of things, the priority of starting a family and finding a job conducive to that goal is really important to Ian, too. It's funny the things you forget to check on specifically like that. It's good to discuss goals and synchronize watches now and then!
T$
Now to tackle another good habit that we need to make: Recycling! I bought a special trashcan for our recyclable goods. I checked at the drop-off at the library what we can recycle. For us, it'll probably be just soft drink containers and maybe the occasional plastic food container. Since I have never been in the habit of recycling in my life, I have no sense whatsoever of what comes packaged in #1 or #2 plastics which are what our city recycles. This will be a learning process -- but an important one. There really never was much excuse for not doing it, so it's time has long since come.
Checked at Wal-Mart for a small heating pad to keep beneath my Tempurpedic pillow this winter since traditionally it freezes like a bag of concrete when it's cold and I have to change pillows in wintertime. No small heating pads. So I checked twin size electric blankets -- $89.95?! Are you kidding me?? Srsly. When did a twin size electric blanket go past $40?? (Uh, 1974, probably.) I did see that they have heated mattress pads -- oh, what a luxury that must be! Ian would never stand for it, however, and really I have to admit that it makes little sense in anything but a super cold climate. Dallas, Texas hardly qualifies.
Ian (and some of the other artists) got an exciting inquiry from BioWare-Austin to do temp work on Star Wars. He'll interview and hear out their offer. It's a 9-12 month contract position for a comparatively low hourly wage. Security is really important to Ian, so he's particularly concerned about the temporary nature of it. Understandably he'll have questions about the potential for the position to be picked up permanently. On the other hand, the insecurity of contract work wouldn't be so bad if the money were good. Having BioWare and this project as the first line on his resume would be very cool... but we're looking to have a baby next year. And really, with me looking down the barrel of 38, we're getting toward the "now or never" stage of things. Having him doing temp work, AND low on the money during a bad economy just not ideal for this particularly year. If Ian were single, or I were his age, we'd be packing our bags to move to Austin now. Things are what they are, however. Still, it's a great honor to be contacted, and certainly worth investigation.
The BioWare email spawned a good discussion yesterday over lunch about our order of priorities and favorite potential jobs right now: This is the Family list, this is the Financial list, Ian's Profession list, Ian's personal, and my personal. We went over our reasons for each placement. It was a good talk -- good to just "touch base" and learn that we really are on the same page with things right now. Previously I had the impression that Ian was so gung-ho about his career at this moment that finding the right professional opportunity was #1 to him no matter what. It did my heart glad to know that given my age and the timing of things, the priority of starting a family and finding a job conducive to that goal is really important to Ian, too. It's funny the things you forget to check on specifically like that. It's good to discuss goals and synchronize watches now and then!
T$