Marie's Advice On Recharging The Old Bio-Battery

   We all get tired and we all have way too much stress in our lives. I don't care what you do, there are things that stress us out and make us tired and we get depressed and bogged down with this roller-costar called life and there are times when you need to learn to take a friggin' break and recharge. In other words, for the purpose of this blog, YOU are the bio-battery. You are the one that holds your life together, the decision-maker, the big boss of your world, and you need a break, okay? Yes, you do, if you are saying no, you are in denial. So I'm going to tell you how to do it, and I recommend doing it once a month, maybe every two months if you are just super busy. I recommend that you get your family in on it, so that they look forward to these days, and learn to participate instead of distracting from your valuable recharge time. Even if you have small kids, I recommend that you try. You days won't go as planned at first, because small kids always come with unanticipated surprises, but eventually, you will get them there. So get started.

Step 1: For a recharge day, you have got to prepare properly. If you work, you are gonna need two consecutive days off, or for a really luxurious day, three. The reason for this is that if you work, you need to do all the non-work work, and usually you need a day off to do that. Stay-at-homers, you need to plan on getting everything done the day before as well, so you are going to have one ultra-busy day. You need to get all the house work done the day before. You need to make all your important calls, pay all your bills, and take care of anything that is weighing on your mind the day before. Do not put it off until the day after, because you know that you will worry about it and that will spoil you recharge. 

Step 2:   You need to carefully plan food for your recharge day. Unless you just really love being in the kitchen, and baking and cooking relaxes you, you need to have easy to prepare snacks and meals. You do not want to follow a strict diet on this day, because being hungry is gonna make you mad, but you don't want to totally pig out, because worrying about eating a whole cake from the bakery is gonna make you feel guilty and make you stress about your weight.

   Personally, I like to have a frozen dinner. Trader Joe's has a wonderful frozen spanakopita, which is a Greek spinach pie. If you are interesting in trying spanakopita and don't have a Trader Joe's near you, Target has a decent option. I like Trader Joe's better, but I do pick them up from Target as well, because I tend to go there more often so it's convenient. Popcorn is a good snack that isn't too unhealthy; popcorn has lots of fiber so it fills you up. My daughter likes hummus, and I like cheese and olives. I also recommend keeping a little chocolate on hand. You don't have to binge on chocolate, but a craving for chocolate can disturb your day, so have a little on hand, just in case. 

Step 3: Do not set your alarm. If your kids are old enough to fend for themselves, then make sure that they understand that either cereal or poptarts or some similar do-it-yourself options are for breakfast, and that they are to get them on their own. If you have little ones, sleeping in is probably a few years away, but let them wake up naturally and try your best to sleep in. No alarms. If you are dealing with some older kids or adults, unless someone is not breathing, bleeding, or in crisis in some way, no one is to wake you up. They need to understand that the consequences will be severe, and that your attitude will be stuck in angry-bear-mode for the rest of the month. 

Step 4: Plan some activities. DO NOT make a frickin itinerary and stick to the thing like glue; that's stressful and no fun. What I mean is to have some movies that the whole family likes to watch, have some video games ready, if your family is into board games, have that ready. DO NOT plan on getting dressed, this is a lazy pajama day. A day at the park is excellent, but something to be done on a different day. Plan stay-at-home, don't get dressed activities, like art projects for the kiddos, movies, book reading, and things along those lines. If you have a good friend that you wanna call and have a good gossip-gab with, a conversation that is completely frivolous, that's fine. Don't talk on the phone with anyone who is going to stress you out, don't answer the phone if work calls, don't pick up for bill collectors, ect. Personally, I am capable of gleefully ignoring all these people, but if you cannot, unplug your house phone and stick the thing in your sock drawer along with all your cell phones. If you like to cook, then cook, but don't do the damn dishes; they will be there tomorrow. If needed, imagine me standing over you and nagging in the most authoritative voice you have ever heard in your life, "Put down the soap and the dish cloth." If dirty dishes bother you, use throw away utensils and plates. You aren't cleaning today.

Step 5: Is optional. If you have a third day, stay up late and sleep in the next morning as well. Nothing feels better than not watching the clock. Staying up late can be as fun as sleeping in, but if you have to work the next day, waking up tired defeats the purpose of a bio-battery recharge, so get enough sleep. FYI: young kids count as work, so you'll need to get to sleep on time. You want this day to help you feel more rested, not make you feel worn out.

   I do this often. Not every day-off, that is not feasible, and would get boring. But I do try to do this once a month, and my daughter loves it! This is my time to teach her how to relieve her stress. We all work on teaching our kids good work ethics, good manners, good social skills, ect., and these are good goals and very important, but we also need to teach them how to effectively relieve stress and take a break, and this is one of my tools. Of course there are park days, and visiting friend days, and hiking days, but this is the recharge day, and has as much value in stress relief as any of the previously mentioned activities. We all need some good couch time in our lives. Plus, if you do have kids or a spouse or whatever, this is a fun and cheap way to have some quality family time. Try it! 

Happy Birthday To A Special, Unique Little Girl

   My niece is turning eight years old soon. She's getting so big! I first met her when she was just a baby (duh), and now she is this big girl. And like all people in my family, she is eccentric. Oh, her quirks started showing early. And her imagination is huge! I remember that at one time, she was terrified to go outside at night, and she urgently hushed anyone who went outside while it was dark and started to speak. After a little digging, we found that she had made up a story for herself, and this story had grown into a real fear. She told us that the owls liked to capture people when they went outside at night, and they found you by the noise that you made. And then they would fly you off to their pink castle, and never let you come home again. She was terrified of getting taken to the pink castle! Of course, this is a family joke now, and she no longer fears the pink castle, but what an imagination! My sister and I laughed so hard at this fear (of course, not while she was telling us, that would have been mean.)

   To this day, my niece's quirkiness still amuses. Her favorite TV character is Gollum, and she is terrified of Honey-Boo-Boo. She loves the movie Ghostbusters, and she thought that Life of Pi was hilarious. No one really knows what is going on in that head of hers, but we all know that she marches to her own drum. She gets it honest, is all I can say.

   My niece has this big laugh, a deep, from-the-belly guffaw that makes everyone else around her laugh. She gets this laugh from my Grandpa, but my Grandpa's laugh sounds so funny coming from this little girl. She's an aggressive hugger with a megawatt smile. She doesn't understand the meaning of stranger-danger. Literally, she doesn't get that concept. Sometimes in the area that I live, you will sometimes get men who come up to stopped car's windows and ask for money. Now,  I feel really bad for the homeless, but this is dangerous. There are such things as car-jackers. So the windows go up and the doors get locked, unless my niece is in the car. And then she is trying to open up her window and talk to them, no matter how shady they look, while her mother and I frantically tell her to knock it off. Which breaks her heart. And she sobs, "I just wanted to talk to him!" A very friendly child, which gives us heart attacks.

   She also has a unique way of looking at things. My mother and I took a summer vacation to Mount Rainier, and my sister couldn't go, but my mom decided to take my niece with us. During that time, the girls (my daughter and niece) took a Junior Ranger class, and they were studying owls (this is waaay after the owl/castle incident, so this was not the trigger) by looking at pictures, which my niece didn't like because of the owls' big eyes, and looking through owl pellets. Which are really gross, and full of the undigested bones of their prey. When the girls were done, and the Ranger who was in charge of the class asked the girls to share something that they learned my niece disgustedly replied, "Eyes and bones." Her voice was so disgusted and so mournful that she got laughter from everyone who heard her reply. 

    My niece is truly a one-of-a-kind girl, and from Auntie to her one-of-a-kind niece, Happy 8th Birthday!

Cars Are Freaking Expensive And I Would Rather Buy Books

   Today's topic is going to be cars. More specifically, why I still don't have one. I was nineteen the last time I actually owned a car, and I was twenty-three the last time I actually drove. That was a while ago, as I am thirty-one now. I know that I once posted this funny little blog about a squirrel  but there are other reasons -- reasons that are actually more pressing the poor Mr. Squirrel. And those reasons are money.
   Yup. That little rectangle of green paper that makes life go round here in the United States. You all know; you are all right here with me, struggling to pay bills and buy food and all that good stuff that takes cold, hard cash. (Or debit cards and checks. Same difference.)
   Let me outline something for you. First, I have always hated driving. At no time in my life have I ever thought driving was in any way fun or entertaining. Speed scares the shit out of me. Second, I don't mind walking -- most of the time. Now let me add some things up for you. Let's talk car payments. The most expensive one that I have heard of is $500, my mom's was around $400 I believe, and my sister's -- the cheapest -- was around $200, but when she went in and bought her car, she practically bought the thing up front. She only owed a couple thousand more, I believe. So say I had the cheapest car payment. That is still $200!! That is over double my light bill. That is more than my cable bill. That is not more than my grocery bills (damn healthy foods), but it's close.
   Still, say I saved (and saved and saved and saved) and bought the car all up front. Does that mean that there are no expenses? No. Washington has an insurance requirement, I believe. So there is insurance. What is that? 100? 80? I don't know. Not free = too much. Then there is gas. Back when I owned a car, gas was $1.38 a gallon, usually. I remember that, because I was extremely poor, and had to budget very carefully just to afford gas, and I used to spend five dollars a week on gas. A gas tank would laugh at me now if I tried that shit. Then you have your maintenance: oil changes, tires, and all that good stuff. Might not be a monthly bill, but I believe that you are supposed to change oil every three months? I could be wrong. But what I do know is that I can't do it: so not free. Not free = too much.
   Now let me explain something else to you: I have always been poor. At one time, I only made $6,000 for an entire year. Since I am not living in a poor country, things are costly. So I had to budget, and I couldn't buy things like books and games. I couldn't even rent my own place; I lived with my mom. And before I lived with my mom, I lived in a one room shack on a piece of land that was used as a garbage dump with 6 other people, and before that I rented an apartment with two other people, and before that, I rented a room in a house. I did not rent the house, I rented a room, and the common areas were shared by three others who also rented a room, and the landlord, who owned the house. So this is the very first time that I have been able to afford to live on my own, in my own apartment. And this is the very first year where I might actually break the poverty line. I might not be under the poverty line this year -- which makes me happy. But because I cut my expenses and don't go in for things that I don't really have to have -- like a car -- I can live above my economic status. I can buy books and games and afford vacations

My sister's car when we went on a winter vacation in the mountains.

sometimes if I plan very carefully. (This need for caution is why I do not enter bookstores unless I do have money. No browsing for me. I know myself too well for that foolishness.)
    I am good at walking, and my mom and sister help me out from time to time. I used to be good at taking the bus, and I could again, but I need to restock my pepper spray. The last time I was on the bus there were four scruffy men in the back of the bus, and the conversation they were having entailed a couple of men explaining to the others that killing a man was actually better than assault, because apparently if you can reduce your sentence to man slaughter, you actually spend less time in jail. Who knew??? And my brain was thinking, "Ummmm, I want off now. I'm good; I can walk." Also, they have made a mess of the bus routes since they redid them all. But give me a good can of pepper spray, and some time to learn the new routes, and I can do the bus again, although that really isn't necessary now that I don't have to commute to a college campus. (The internet is a wonderful thing.)
   But I am not putting the money out on a car right now. Some things are worth more to some people, and I am going to tell you, in the issue of car versus books, books win. I want my money to go into making my house look like you've just walked into a bookstore. Ahhhhhh, dream big, Marie. 

A Ramble About Money

   Today, I was checking, because I've been checking all week, because I only got scheduled one day off, and although I decided to roll with it and just work the extra day because I have a vacation coming up and I need the extra money, I am reserving the right to complain about this extra day of work until I am forty. But I digress. I was checking today, was how this story was going, and one of my customers' bill came up to a little over $100, and she had a kid. And that kid's eyes popped out of his little head, and he said in an awed voice, "Whoa, that's a lot of money." And his mom looked at me and we laughed at this little piece of naive childhood, because all of us adults know that $100 in the U.S., that doesn't get you very far.
  But that is also a bit of naivety that I can relate too, and this actually brought to mind a childhood vacation from when I was a child myself. My mom, sister, and I were visiting my dad in Maryland (before they divorced). My dad was in the Air Force (which is why I was born in Japan, because my mom was overseas with my dad when I was born) and for a while, he didn't live with us because he was going to all these overseas places so we went and lived in Mississippi, where he is from, while he did his job overseas. But for a short period of time, he was not stationed overseas, but was in Maryland, so we went to visit him. So I don't suppose that this was a vacation trip for him, but it was for us, and he recognized that, and as a gift upon our arrival, he gave my sister and I both a hundred dollar bill to use as spending money while we were there.
   $100!!! That seemed like a fortune. And actually, to just give that to a kid as spending money, that is a lot of money, but I remember the shock of holding that money. I felt so rich. But even better than this feeling, is my sister's reaction. (Hehe, she's gonna kill me.) My sister was so happy to have that, and so determined that no one was going to take that money, that she took that bill, and stuck the entire thing in her mouth. She figured that no one would want the $100 back if her slobber was all over it. She's such a germaphobe, this made sense to her because she hates other people's slobber, but she was just a kid, so she had no knowledge of how dirty money really is. She is probably highly disgusted that she ever did such a thing. But her taking that money and cramming it in her mouth made my dad laugh and laugh and laugh.
   Of course, now a hundred bucks doesn't seem so much. Buying a game takes over half of that money right away, if you buy it new. And that won't even cover the bill if  I go shopping for books. Don't get me started on the grocery bill -- I try to eat somewhat healthy, and healthy food is way more expensive than junk food. And my daughter's favorite fruit is cherries, the most freaking expensive fruit I've ever bought. A little bag of cherries costs me eight to twelve dollars at the store. Can't that kid like apples the best????
   But I understand that kid's awe (not mine, the customer's), because a hundred does seem like a lot, and I understand the parent's wry  amusement, because what is a lot to a kid, isn't much to an adult. (Although that was a LOT of money to give to a kid just to spend. My dad must have saved up and done without to give that to us.) And the whole point of this blog post might have just been to tell the world that my sister once crammed a hundred dollar bill in her mouth. I'll never admit that though. It's a mystery.....

She Keeps On Growing Up!!!

   For the twentieth time this evening alone, my daughter has walked into our living room and asked, "You remember that tomorrow is my fifth grade graduation, right?"
   Because I could forget? Every day my own eyes confirm the fact that she is not my little chubby toddler anymore. She is growing like a weed, and there is no denying this fact. But the fifth grade graduation is something that is new to me. I never had a fifth grade graduation; when did they start this? Of course, this is not the shocker that her kindergarten graduation was; that was a real shocker. Celebrate getting through kindergarten? If that is difficult, let me tell you kid, life is gonna be a rude awakening.
   Of course, kindergarten is not what it used to be. I remember kindergarten, and we used to get praised if we just managed to color in the lines. When my daughter started kindergarten she was already expected to know the entire alphabet on entrance and how to count to ten. On exit; she had learned to read and to count to 100. I was like "Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat???" So I guess that the graduation of kindergarten does deserve comment, because those kids learn A LOT.
    So I knew that this graduation was coming. I've been expecting it. Of course, getting the date was an accomplishment in and of itself. Doesn't the school system realize that a lot of parents have to work and need these dates in advance so that they can make arrangements at work? But we have had all of this worked out, so it's a little insulting that my daughter feels the need to remind me twenty times in one evening. I go to every school function, so it's not like she is worried because I have a habit of skipping out. I think that mostly nerves are causing this questioning. She's so excited to be a middle school student next year! And she has worked really hard to get there. Learning standards in the classroom have gone up from my own school days. I'm sure some of the work I have seen her with is because she is in the HCP class. (Highly Capable Programming, formerly called GATE, which stood for Gifted and Talented Education; why did they change the title? It's a mystery...) But I have seen her bringing home algebra, and then I'm all like !!??!! because I didn't touch algebra until I was in the 6th or 7th grade, and she started bringing it home in 3rd grade. And I know that all the classes take timed math tests. She had tests where she was supposed to answer 100
multiplication questions in 10 minutes. That is amazing to me. Sure, they are not complicated multiplication questions, but nevertheless, I couldn't do it. So I guess that these fifth graders, they deserve their graduation. Because they have already worked so hard to get where they are at, and frankly, we need to do these things if this will encourage them to stay in school. I never felt encouraged, and I was a  high school drop-out. If keeping my daughter from doing the same means that I go celebrate every single day she goes to school at all, then this is what I will do. (It's a good thing that so far, my daughter loves school, because celebrating is expensive. I would need another job.)
   So anyway, this long, rambling post is simply my way of working up to saying:

Congratulations Baby Girl!!! Mom is so proud of you!