Well the weather has cooled down just a little, wish it was this nice 2 days ago when I hit that metal pipe sticking out of the ground and tore up my hay cutter! 7 sickle teeth, the reel guide got bent up pretty bad and 4 pick up tines got broke off. I was NOT a happy camper! The sky picture was supposed to be a red tailed hawk that was circling for the field mice i was chasing out for him but apparently I missed him in the sunlight. Kind of hard to look at the phone while bouncing up and down on the tractor, plus the glare from the sun. maybe I'll catch him next time, LOL. I spent 4 hours raking today just to watch the round baler break down. Glad that darn thing isn't mine! Even more glad I wasn't pulling it when it broke!
I spoke with a couple of neighbors on the backroad
who filled me in on all the latest gossip in my township plus some interesting tidbits on grocery prices, utility costs, etc. Looks like prices keep going up on everything. I also read this evening over at blacklisted news about food riots in Africa (even found a mildly written article on Foxnews about it) over the cost of their bread. Could that type of behavior happen here in the USA? I think it could. Just a few years ago, I'm pretty sure my family had a solid middle class life. Now, we feel more like the working poor. The same money that covered our mortgage, insurance and taxes is not doing such a good job. It's not a low wage paycheck I'm talking about either. How are people living on minimum wage surviving? How are people making less than $20 an hour surviving? Plus, those people are spending money on groceries. Thank God I don't have to do that or we'd really be in a mess.
There has never been a better time than now to work on becoming even just a little bit self sustained. Even a small reduction in your utility use is going to help. Not making a bunch of small trips to the store for just one item helps too. Learning more about cooking and baking, preparing food for yourself instead of eating out saves big bucks each month. I think we are all going to need to think more about these expenses and cut out everything not absolutely necessary in the immediate future to survive this economy.
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Some people are working two or more jobs at little more than minimum wage, or pickup seasonal or temporary work when they can find it. Most available jobs are part-time. I was in an Aldi grocery on Saturday and there had to be 50 people applying for jobs and more were arriving as I left the store.
ReplyDeleteBoy, the story about the mowing machine, sure sounds like what happens around here during hay season. lol. I'm right with ya there on the prices of everything going up. Not good.
ReplyDeleteIt's hard let me tell you. My husband makes $14/hour. I am pregnant with our third child. We get by not going out, I stay home with the kids(both toddlers) as it saves money both in childcare costs and gives me the ability to garden more, make homemade bread,etc., and we cut all our bills to a min. That means no cable, only dial-up internet ($9 a month), basic home phone, and for cell phones we use pay as you go phones and only use them for emergencies, etc. For any extra stuff we wait for the 2 months a year were he gets three paychecks a month instead of 2, and we use the "extra" paycheck to buy any odd ends or fix stuff. This year alone we had to sink $2500 in the truck that he uses for work and hauling wood and unfortunately that had to go on a credit card we are trying to pay down. Also add the weed eater dieing(not replacing), a broken pump on the washing machine, and the master tub with a big hole in it (defective model-only 5 yrs old, manufacturer told us as our warranty expired 2 yrs before), well lets just say its not easy. The one thing that helps us get by is whatever we get back in taxes. We raise our own chickens and butcher them also. I garden, can, and make all meals from scratch (something that completely mystifies everyone my hubby works with). We get beef from my mom and dad every year for Christmas, they live just up the road.With prices going up we just cut out more and more. In a way it has caused us to become more inventive. So in case any one wonders how people who are poor do it....well lets just say its not easy. Also we buy insurance through my hubbies work, while we sometimes need a little assistance from government or others we try to use it as little as possible and by the way I hate that we get into binds that get us to that point..I don't want to be known as a freeloader. By the way I love your blog.
ReplyDeleteHello Coley! Glad you stopping and shared with me. I so can relate, we are right there with you. We also have had the plumbing problems this year, add a hot water tank to the rotten tub. It really is disheartening isn't it? We just have to be so darn tough to make it thru it all. LOL on the mystified thing, same here! I'm down to using free wi-fi, phone had to go. I use the prepaid too but I never have money for minutes. isn't that pitiful? Electric is next I'm afraid. Won't that be an experience, LOL. Keep hanging in, we're going to make it, we're too tough not to.
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