Let me win

DD and I planted some flowers and herbs today and did a lot of yard work. I have a bunch of small logs that the power line cutters left behind. They would make great firewood but since I don't have a woodburner I am trying to think what I can use them for.
Here is a really cool site to win an awesome purse. Last year I entered contests all the time and won something about once a month. For some odd reason I quit doing that. I would like to start again.

Homesteading

You will notice I have added some more blog links. I have been surfing homesteading blogs. I think thats what I would like to save enough to be able to do. I remember when I was a little girl making my own vinegar following a recipe from the Foxfire series. I used to always read the Mother Earth magazines too. I wonder how I got so far from that dream. Perhaps I am really too lazy for true homesteading but I would like to become more self sufficient. I am going to see how close I can get to this dream.

Another week gone by

Saturday we had my cousin's daughter for most of the day. We ate at the Olive Garden and shopped at the mall. Got a bunch of earrings, hair scrunchies and something called a pony flip. I used to have one and lost it ages ago. Its a simple plastic piece but I never had luck recreating it on my own. Anyway it was only $3 so I got 2 since I had wanted one forever. Finally we took T home. A couple hours later we get a call that T's mom and the mom's bf had been in a car wreck. I had to go to the hospital to get them. I got lost twice, I hate big hospitals. But thankfully they were ok. The wife of one of the guys from work was in a head on wreck the same night and she was a lot more seriously injured. She will be ok though.
I am still driving on the same $42 gas but I have seriously cut back on driving. I am doing way better at being frugal though. I only ate out twice this week for lunch. Next week I am going to be more prepared and take lunch daily.
I heard yesterday that congress voted to raise the minimum wage by over $2. I think thats a good thing but I do wonder about the mom and pop places, gas is already hurting these places.
I chose not to go to the family reunion. There were just too many memories of people who have passed on and won't be there for me to be able to enjoy it. M did not get a car for various reasons so she wasn't able to go to WV either. She claims she is getting one with her next pay check and then going in the next weekend. With this week's challenges and a couple of rank badges, I finally have over 100 badges in Pogo. I have completed all the challenge badges in payday freecell so think I will move onto Mahjong challenges. I love that game so should be fun.

Weekly update

One of the women in the office just graduated with an associates in networking. I am going to get a little cake and take in Monday. We didn't do anything for her and it just seems like we should. She says she isn't going to find another job though. Seems pointless to have gotten the degree if you aren't going to use it. I got a bit annoyed today at work. Last year I signed up to be a first aid provider under the previous employers. They sent a notice about going for recertification a couple days ago and I realized its not something I want to do anymore. Well unless I just act like a total ass I am stuck with it this year. Its not like you get paid anymore for doing it. I have told them to not put me in for training next year that I wasn't interested for sure.
I filled my car up this evening and it cost $42. I have never spent that much for gas even when I had a big 8 cylinder car. They can say all they want that high gas prices won't affect people driving but it sure affects me. I can't afford $40 a week for gas. I am going to stop paying for tanning at the gym and tell them I won't be renewing my membership. I am looking for every little way possible to save money. I dont think I am going to the family reunion. I don't want to be up there 2 days when I am only off 3 and I can't justify the cost of gas to go up and back in one day. I would like to see Debbie and a few others but I doubt its going to happen.
I got a tracfone tonight at family dollar. They had some that were $9 but I got one that was $30 because its a flip phone. I like tracfone because I always got service about everywhere when I used my other one.
My sister sent me a link to get some tokens for pogo. If anyone plays, the site is http://www.badgeaddicts.com/freetokens.html. I got 400000 tokens tonight putting me over 1 million finally.

Weekly update

Well the parts that David put on the car didn’t fix it. Sometimes it still won’t start although it does seem to start more often so that lets out going to the gym before work. I think this week though I am going to start to go after work 3 days a week. That way I can just wait until it feels like starting. I did go to curves 3 x this week and went to the park and walked last night. I have tried to be more active and eat a bit less. I have lost 4 lbs since last weekend. So that is in line with my 3lb goal.

Work has been the usual mess. The switcher some how managed to put a Cheetah box in the door and said it was an MOL box so it had to be unloaded and redone. Then for some reason on Wednesday they fired one of the truck loaders. I haven’t heard anyone say why. I am now doing the shipment information for all of IO. So far so good. I am thinking about raises in July and I think if I don’t get at least $1 I am going to quit even if I have to take a lesser paying job. I was told that if we all picked up the extra work instead of them having to hire someone, that we would get better raises. The least they could have hired someone at would have been $10 so I think they should in all fairness give us at least $1.50 raises.

Still no car for Mandi. We haven’t really looked. My cousin sent me an email today with a pic of her new engagement ring. Its beautiful. I hope they are very happy always. We went to Mayfest today and wandered. I found the cutest wicker desk set for $50 for the desk and chair. I paid half as a deposit and will send Mandi on Tuesday I think to pick it up . On the way back it started to rain. We got drenched since we had walked from my aunt’s house to the festival. We looked like drowned rats. As soon as we got back we drove straight home so we could change clothes. My aunt has met a man online she wants to go out with so now she is dragging me along because he wanted her to bring a friend for his friend. I figured I wasn’t doing anything anyway and how bad could it be. Its only one night. I think next Friday is the date.

diet

I got up this morning and weighed myself. I weigh more than I have ever weighed in my life. I am so totally disgusted. Today is the beginning of a new phase for me. I want to lose 129 lbs. That is 338 days away. So roughly I need to lose a lb every 3 days to make my goal. Hopefully David can get my car fixed today and I am can start going to the gym every day before work. I do better if I exercise first thing. I am also going to have a protein shake for breakfast every morning. I am not hungry midmorning if I have one early. This is the absolute end. I am tired of being fat and I sure as heck don’t want to be 40 and fat.

Stupidity

I went to Target tonight and saw the cutest T-Mobile cell phone on clearance. I bought it since I had needed another cell for a while now. I also got a cd player on clearance for about $14. I have wanted one for a long time now since my computer cd player quit working. Anyway when I go to check out they said I was pre approved for a Target card. I went ahead and got it since I considered it another step in repairing my credit. You have to use credit to rebuild credit. I leave Target quite happy about the deals I got. I get home and charge up the cell phone and go to activate it. T-Mobile doesn’t have phone service in NC, so why the hell does Target sell the phones?

On a good note, I got my cd player working and am now listening to Book of Shadows cd by Zack Wyld. God he is so talented.