My computer problems are now mostly history, although I still can't print; my new printer has been ordered and should be here on Friday.

I'm loving my enhanced 4 GB of memory; what a world of difference it's making.

A technician came to the house last night and replaced the motherboard, memory and power supply on my brand new Dell, and whatever was causing my problem was fixed by those replacements.

As for what's happening with that job interview, I had, I can tell you now they're doing a background check on me, so I guess i'm still in the running.

On top of that, I also have a phone interview set up with a large financial company in my area. They need a content writer for their continuing education programs, to focus largely on estate planning.

This, after many months of inactivity on the job front.

After that phone interview, which I'll spend all morning preparing for, I'll head south to do another focus group thing with a potato chip company. I'm the "floater," meaning I'll only be interviewed on my potato chip eating habits should one of their scheduled participants fail to show up. Either way, I'll collect $125 for my trouble.

On Friday, I'm having my home undergo an energy efficiency test, complete with blower door test to detect hidden drafts, up to 25 CFLS bulbs, insulation around doors and windows, etc. The work is subsidized by the electric company and normally costs $75, but I got a discount coupon from the Sierra Club website so i only have to pay $50, and i think the cost of those CFL bulbs will practically add up to $50, so it will be worth it.

I'm curious what that blower door test will reveal. This is a 75+ year old house so I certainly expect drafts to be present, although they don't seem severe enough that I really notice them, except for under and around my doorways. The windows seem ok, but who knows?

I went to the bank that holds my mortgage and gave them a check for $22K to apply to my mortgage, bringing the balance down to $38,000. I didn't plan it this way, but having done that means that with my normal payments, I'll have the thing paid off in 6 years, which is the same timeframe I'd been planning on for the many years I've prepaid the mortgage.

I still plan to continue with prepayments, once I get a job, so I expect and hope to pay off the mortgage before the 6 years are up.

Now I don't have to feel so bad as I continue to pay 6% on my mortgage (can't refinance when you don't have a job) and my investments make around 1.2%.

About $12,000 of that $22,000 prepayment came from a taxable mutual fund I liquidated. That will be considered taxable income, but I still think that even with that I should remain in a lower 15% tax bracket.

I'd been planning all year to do a Roth IRA conversion becus i knew my tax bracket would be low, since I'm unemployed. But I decided that paying down the mortgage would have a bigger impact on my finances then doing a big Roth IRA conversion.

So, I got my new Dell Inspiron 570 MT computer this past Thursday.

I spent the better part of Thursday, and part of the day on Friday, resolving various issues, and I'm still not completely up and running.

On the plus side, I am internet- and email connected. The difference in speed between my new computer and the old one is like night and day. I love the wireless mouse and keyboard, but I'm still getting used to the keyboard.

But here are some of the problems:

In the package, I purchased 3 years of McAfee software, but when I got the computer, it indicated I only had 30 days. So that necessitated a phone call to Dell, and then a 3-way phone call with McAfee, and about an hour of time to resolve this simple omission.

A bigger problem is that the Word/PP/Excel that's apparently on my machine is not accessible to me until I "unlock" it using a product key code which Dell was supposed to ship to me under separate cover. (I guess this prevents people from loading the software onto more than one computer.) I was supposed to get that from UPS last MONDAY, but despite the UPS website indicating each day that it was "in transit," I never got it. So Dell finally agreed to send out another product code key which I'm now supposed to get Monday or Tuesday.

It's a real pain in the butt becus i can't use my computer now to respond to a job posting I saw over the weekend, if I want to attach my resume and writing samples, or do any work involving Word documents.

The 3rd and final straw was when I couldn't get my printer to work. When I called Dell tech support yet again, they said that my Dell printer was not compatible with Windows 7. It'snot that old,maybe 5 years, and works fine. You would have thought that the Dell salesperson who sold me the computer might have inquired what printer I had, especially since I ordered a print cartridge from him in the same purchase. Since I needed to tell him the model printer so he could determine the cartridge size, you'd think that would have alerted him to the fact I couldn't use it.

So that means yet another outlay of money for the printer and cartridges. I did make arrangements to return the cartridge I purchased which is now useless to me and i have a call in to Dell sales asking for a callback.

I hope to get a credit toward to purchase of a Dell printer for all the inconvenience of having to wait over a week to use the computer waiting for the software key, and now the lack of a printer.

It's all been very annoying.

On top of that, all the photos i copied onto disks apparently didn't take. It looks like I copied empty folders. I know i could have used a flash drive instead of 4 disks, but i had them here and didn't want to spend more money if i didn't have to. Looks like I'll now have to reconnect to the old hard drive and try the process all over again, this time using a flash drive.

BA, I do wish you were here to help me!!

I had no luck trying to get ointment in the cat's ears. I called the vet and asked if they have an oral antibiotic I could try instead. They agreed (why didn't anyone suggest that before?) and Waldo's now into his 3rd day on the pills, which i can much more easily hide in the center of a soft snack and which he'll then swallow whole. I have yet to see any lessening of head scratching and shaking but I pray this does the trick. Is it possible it could be a fungal infection, not a bacterial infection, that wouldn't respond to antibiotics??

My other piece of major news:

Had a conversation with my absentee builder/handyman..you know, the guy who doe great work, like my sun room, but who never finishes a job o time. Anyway, he finally did show up on Thursday, but only to say he hadn't forgotten about me and would definitely be here by Saturday. (He wasn't.) But anyway, we had a talk which got around to Dave Ramsey and paying off the mortgage and all that.

This was the final nudge I needed to finally take definitive action. I cashed in 1 mutual fund and $9,000 from an online money market fund for a total of $22K going into my checking account. When it clears my checking, I'm writing out a check to the bank that holds my mortgage and I will pay off not the whole thing, but a big chunk of it, thereby saving myself a lot in interest.

Yeah, I may be unemployed, but it just doesn't make sense to have money sitting in accounts earning around 1.25% when my mortgage is 6%. (I can't refinance becus I'm unemployed.)

Hopefully I'll be able to pay down that mortgage next week. I'm not sure I'm ready to pay off the whole thing (cashing in more mutual funds would be considered taxable income that would bump me into a higher tax bracket, and right now I'm in the comfy 15% bracket where I'd like to stay this year), altho I could, but doing this much will make me feel better. The balance should then be about $38K.

Even after paying down the mortgage, I'll still have about $94K in taxable money left.

I had a 9:30 a.m. appointment at the vet to bring Waldo in to treat his ear infection.

At 8:30 a.m., a woman I hadn't met before, Kelly, came over to the house as prearranged to catch Waldo for me and put him in the carrier. She's the person I referred to before as "the cat wrangler," and I had been put in touch with her by a volunteer at the shelter where I adopted Waldo.

I had corralled Waldo into a small spare bedroom upstairs with very little furniture in it earlier. He was already freaked about that, but there was no avoiding it.

Kelly went up there, closed the door and I waited nervously downstairs in the kitchen. There was a lot of commotion and bumping around and I heard Waldo's plaintive, distraught meow, as if to say, "WHY are you doing this to me?"

She got him in the carrier and brought him downstairs. I thanked her profusely and offered her some homegrown tomatoes, which she refused. She had taken time off from work to do this for me and I was very grateful becus I HAD NO OTHER OPTIONS.

She said he looked very healthy and did not think he was underweight; she said he was all muscle. (She works with a lot of very sickly, unhealthy wild cats who live outdoors.)

It was too early to leave for the vet appointment, so i figured Waldo would have 30 minutes or so to settle down in the carrier. He was hunkered down and pretty quiet when I looked in there.

I went upstairs and was getting ready to go. I heard some scratching and figured it was Waldo trying in vain to get out. I didn't go to check immediately, but did so perhaps 5 minutes later.

The door to the carrier was off its hinges and Waldo was gone.

I couldn't believe it. I decided to try to get Waldo back in the that spare bedroom. I first called the cat wrangler back and got her machine, so i left a message and said if there's any way you'd be willing to come back and do it again, that would be great.

Waldo was hiding in the basement. I got him out of the basement, but this time, Waldo wouldn't go upstairs to the 2nd floor becus he knew i had all the doors closed except the one to the room he'd been trapped in before, and he didn't want to go up there. I kept chasing him around downstairs in a circle, from living room to dining room to kitchen, hoping that as he rounded the front, he'd go up the stairs, but he wouldn't go up any more.

Finally, i got him up there and closed the door. He was panting and totally scared.

The cat wrangler called me back and said she didn't like to try catching a feral cat more than once in a day cus it was too traumatizing to the cat. She ended up calling the vet's for me and explaining the cat could not be caught and the vet's office agreed to give me the meds for his ear infection so i went down there and picked it up.

I have serious misgivings about whether I'll be able to administer the ointment, but I have to try. It will probably be a few days before Waldo even trusts me again to let me touch hm. I feel terrible for him, but what else could I do?

If I had thought through how difficult it would be to get him to a vet when needed, I probably wouldn't have ever adopted him. I just hoped and assumed at the time that I wouldn't need to get him to the vet for a while and that, in the meantime, I'd be able to get him used to me and unafraid.

He has made great progress. He often sleeps in bed with me, curling up behind my legs, and he loves to be petted and sometimes brushed. But if you move the wrong way, or too quickly, he leaps away.

He's still a very, very timid cat and I can't pick him up. I've been in a real quandary about this ear infection. I used to know a few vets who made house calls, but 1 stopped doing it cus i'm guessing it wasn't profitable enough for the trouble you go to, the other won't come out to my town (too far) and another one would, but wanted to charge me exorbitantly to do so, and being jobless for so long i have to be careful about expenses.

So you can imagine how relieved I was to have the cat wrangler come over to help me, only to feel incredibly at a loss when the cat escaped after she left.

It was an enjoyable, if not exhilarating day. The weather was overcast and on the cool side, and quite blustery outside, so unlike the late August weather that should be here.

The guy came to clean the furnace, to the tune of about $136. Didn't want to pay it, but I skipped the furnace cleaning last year and if there's one thing I always want running in tip top shape, it's the furnace in the middle of winter.

I guess I'll cave and schedule an appointment for a chimney cleaning, for the same reason: I skipped it last year as a money-saving measure.

I continued reading one of my favorite authors, Dr. Weil. I'm reading Spontaneous Healing, and I think this the third one of his books I've read.

Made a run to the landfill and also grocery shopping. I plan to make falafels tomorrow.

Tomorrow will be a stressful day, getting the cat to the vet. I'll be glad when it's over. The Cat Wrangler will be here around 8:30 a.m. to catch the cat and put him the carrier (hopefully).

And the trip to the vet will mean another big bill. (Sigh.)

Hoping to hear sometime this week from the place I interviewed at. They didn't say it would be this week, but I am hoping. At the same time, I don't want the job becus I enjoy my independence. Oh well. It's either one extreme or the other. If they think my salary request is too high, I hope to propose a 4-day week at a proportionately lower salary. I'd take less money for a permanent 3-day weekend any time. I did that once before with another job, and while I said, well, I can try to freelance on that 5th day, i never really did, just enjoyed the extra free time to myself and to be honest, the work week seemed just as long!

Waldo has a probable ear infection. I need to get him to the vet, but I can't catch him. He won't let me pick him up.

I contacted the shelter volunteer who helped me adopt him. I met her at a vet clinic midway between my house and the shelter, where she loaned me an illuminated magnifying scope that vets use to look for ear mites inside the ear. Luther's ears looked very clean, but Waldo won't let me look at his, especially since I have to lean in close right in front of him.

The shelter volunteer was at the vet's with another shelter cat who also had ear problems, and she invited me in to the exam room when the vet looked at the cat. This was nice becus I got a chance to meet the vet, who handles all the animals from the shelter, even while the head of the shelter owes him $90K in vet bills, which he's unlikely to pay since the shelter building is in foreclosure. The vet seems pretty nice, and he's treated Waldo before when he still lived at the shelter, when he had a really bad ear infection, so he's somewhat familiar with the cat.

The shelter volunteer also gave me the number of a woman in my town who's got a reputation as something of a Cat Wrangler. Meaning, she can catch any cat, or at least, that's what they say. I need to call her today to see if she'd be willing to help me. I'm really running out of options, and Waldo is very uncomfortable scratching and shaking his head all the time.

I hope to get him in to the vet's tomorrow if I can get an appointment then and have the Cat Wrangler help me.

So, I'm hopeful I'll find out this week whether I'll get a job offer or not. If a full-time job doesn't work out, freelance will be better than nothing.

If the best case scenario happens, I began thinking of things I'd like to take care of before I started work. Things that might otherwise require time away from work or coming in late to work, which I'd rather not do with a brand new job. I need to have my furnace cleaned (skipped it last year) and the chimney cleaned (skipped it last year). I don't need an oil change, so all set there, I may let my hair get a little longer for a while anyway.

It would be nice to squeeze in a kayak ride as I haven't gone all year, as well as a bike ride.

Someone I know invited me to pick some (organic!) peaches at a nearby farm, so I collected a small bag of small, hard, blotchy and green peaches, not expecting much. I let them sit on the counter for a week, then checked them and discovered they were all suddenly very ripe. I had to throw 2 out, but I tried eating one and it was very sweet.

So, adapting my grandmother's apple crisp recipe, I made a peach and wineberry crisp, using a bag of wineberries I'd picked on my property in July. I had to peel the peaches because they were so blotchy, and since they were so ripe, it was pretty messy. But oh so worth it. The crisp, with walnuts and raisins, is quite yummy.

If you'd like to see what else I've been picking, check out the photo at my gardening

I've had Windows XP since around 2003, I guess. It sucks. Nearly every day, I battle with my computer. It crashes, it locks up, I get strange error messages telling me a script is still running. Most of the time, after failing to shut down non-responsive programs, I have to just shut the computer off and re-boot.

And it is SUPER slow.Slow. Slow.

I guess it was the thought that I might possibly get the freelance writing job with this place I'm going to interview at tomorrow that got me thinking about replacing this wretched beast called a computer.

I'm looking at the Dell Inspiron 570 MT. It comes with 3 GB of memory, 2010 Word, Excel and Powerpoint and free shipping. It doesn't include the speakers or monitor, which I already have and will keep from my current computer. The only accessory I splurged on was a wireless keypad and mouse, which would be great on my cluttered desk. The security software I think I would buy separately as Dell only offers McAfee. The cost for all this is $624.

I'm not a gamer and I don't save videos; mainly, I use word for text documents and like to fool around with photos. So this is supposed to be more than ample for my needs.

It's gotten solid reviews, even the Editor's Choice, from PC Magazine.

It's still a lot of money, and I'm not working steadily. Also, I dread the thought of set-up and transferring all my documents/photos from my old computer to the new one.

If you have any feedback on my choice of computer or have experience with it, please let me know!

Isn't she a beauty?



I plan to eat her tonight.

This a.m. I turned in my Census bag and ID badge, so it's official. I'm done! I wished my crew leader (and her husband, who just got laid off) luck in finding a new job. She wished me the same.

I'm meeting a friend for lunch in a little while; it was a rescheduled birthday lunch for me that never came about last week. And I have a coupon good for a free appetizer, which we can split.

I went to the dump yesterday, but now the dump is closed on Mondays, so this was the SECOND time I had to return back home with my smelly trash and unload it back into the cans. The worst!! Went to the dump again today and got rid of it, finally.

After reading the aptly titled book, "Get a Life! You Don't Need a Million to Retire Well," I decided to recalculate how much $$ I'll need in retirement.

In past calculations, I never included or counted on Social Security benefits because of the uncertainty the program would remain intact or would have any money left. Perhaps politicians will tinker with it but I highly doubt it would go away completely just before millions of baby boomers enter the system.

Anyway, in the past, I always aimed for a million dollars, plus an extra $250,00 for out of pocket healthcare expenses. So, $1.2 million.

Now I've redone my calculations including Social Security benefits and I am happily surprised at how much LESS I'll need, even when factoring in 3% inflation.

My target retirement age is 60, just 9 years away.

Here, then, are my detailed calculations, if you care to follow along to the remarkable conclusion.

Social Security Benefit Estimates
(These numbers are based on the annual statements we all get from the SSA. Since my income varies widely from year to year, I decided to include the last 3 years worth of estimated SS benefits so I had a low and high range of expected benefits.)

SS Estimate If I collect benefits at age 62
2010 $1454 x 12 = $17,448
2009 $1430 x 12 = $17160
2008 $1355 x 12 = $16,260

SS Estimate At age 66 + 10 months
2010 $2094 x 12 = $25,128
2009 $2064 x 12 = $24,768
2008 $1949 x 12 = $23,388

Expense Estimates
To calculate my average annual expenses in retirement, I knew I could start with my existing annual expenses and then subtract certain things that won't be an issue when I retire, such as my mortgage, the bulk of what I spend on gas (for commuting) and a portion of what I spend on clothing (office attire).

I've tracked ALL my expenses for over 15 years, so I already know what I spent, pretty much to the dollar, for any given year.

Average annual expenses from last 5 years: $43,300
Average mortgage payments, last 5 years: $10,400
75% of average commuting gas, last 5 years: $486
(Last year, I had a 45-minute commute while prior to that I had a 3-minute commute.)
50% of average spent on clothing, last 5 years: 365

To calculate average annual expenses in retirement, subtract:
• Mortgage payments
• 75% of average gas expenses, last 5 yrs
• 50% of average spent on clothing last 5 yrs

Projected Average Annual Expenses in Retirement: $32,049

Retirement Scenario 1: Retire at age 60 and start collecting SS at age 62.

From age 60 until age 62 + 10 mths: (3 yrs)
Personal Savings needed: $32,049 x 3 = $96,147
SS benefits: 0

From age 62 + 10 mths. through 93 (30 years)
Personal Savings: $438,030 to $473,670

SS benefits, low-end estimate: $16,260 x 30 = $487,800

SS benefits, hi-end estimate: $17,448 x 30 = $523,440

Total Needed for Retirement at age 60 and Collecting SS at age 62: Between $534,177 and $569,817

Adjusted for inflation (assuming 3%) and 10 more years:
Between $715,797 and $$763,554
(Source p. 259 inflation chart, Get a Life book)

Retirement Scenario 2: Retire at age 60 and start collecting SS at age 66 + 10 mths. (full retirement age)

From age 60 until age 66+10 mths.(7 yrs)
Personal Savings: $224,343
Social Security: 0

From age 66+10 mths through 93 (26 years)
Personal Savings: $179946 - $225,186
SS benefits, low-end estimate: $23,388 x 26 = $608,088
SS benefits, hi-end estimate: $25,128 x 26 = $653,328

Total Needed for Retirement at Age 60 and Collecting SS at 66+ 10 mths:
Between $404,289 and $449,529

Adjusted for (3%) Inflation and 10 more Years:
Between $541,747 and $602,368

If Congress tinkers with SS benefits, it seems likely that any new law would affect benefits for those not yet collecting SS, and that any newly enacted law would take at least a year to take effect; even so, I could watch the news and take steps to start collecting SS at next birthday anniversary if I saw that Congress was discussing limiting benefits. (Of course, that's assuming they don't meddle with SS in the next 9 years, becus if they did then, I'd be stuck.)

Calculations DON'T account for 1) lower expenses due to selling house and moving into condo or 2) income earned from p/t work.

So, the interesting takeaway from all this number-crunching is how much LESS personal savings I'd need for retirement if I wait to collect Social Security until my full retirement age, 66 and 10 months, vs. taking SS benefits as soon as I was eligible to do so, which would be 5 years earlier, at age 62.

For all my money worries, if would seem likely that looking at my current investments of $459,000, I would reach the minimum target of $541,747 even if I made no further contributions.

So while I plan to add to my retirement anyway (once I get a job again), it's a huge comfort knowing that all I really need to do is stay the course, preserving the investments I already have. I won't be touching principal except to withdraw about $18K in a few years to buy a new car (the Ford Fiesta). I pay cash to avoid interest and car payments.

What do you think?

My productivity of yesterday has slid away today as quickly as the humidity returned to my area.

When it's warm and humid, I don't want to do anything! Can't muster up the energy!

So I headed for Wal-Mart this a.m. as I was running low on cat food. My cats go through cat food like crazy, and what a cost difference between my previous cat eating just dry food and my now 2 cats eating canned food only. Between the 2 of them, they eat 5 cans a day, plus Luther begs for his dry food by day's end, too.

Anyway, for someone who's trying her darndest not to spend anything, sometimes I just like to go to Wal-Mart and browse the store. I got a case of TP at .46 a roll (I guess that's good), 3 pairs of panties for $1 each and a summer top for $10, plus about 6 cases of cat food.

I also stopped at Ace to get more paint so I can finish painting the tool shed. Back when the Benjamin Store store was the only place in town, I'd often go there for paint just to avoid the longer drive to Home Depot. Well, what a price difference. Ben. Moore paint was approaching $50 a gallon (ridiculous, right?) while an gallon of Ace costs about $23.

But due to the just returned crappy heat, I won't be painting today, or the next few days, as far as I can tell.

Aside from that bit of shopping, I spent some time reading my newest book from the library, Insects and Gardens.

I was in touch with my contact with one of the focus groups and sounds like she's got one for me, but we kept missing each other on the phone so hope to connect with her on Monday.

I'm also going to sign up for an energy-efficiency home audit, which includes the blower door test that detects unseen drafts. There's another type of utility company-sponsored home energy audit I could get for free, since I'm unemployed, but that one doesn't include the blower door test. It normally costs just $75, but i found a coupon for $25 on the Sierra Club site, so I think it's worth the $50 since they do all the fixing right there on the spot, plus all the CFL bulb replacements and other stuff. I'm a little concerned about how freaked out my one cat will be since they'll be in every room of the house.

Nothing else terribly exciting around here.

Yum.



Wading into the jungle that is my vegetable garden to find hidden treasures is what makes gardening so rewarding.



I blanched and froze 4 zucchini tonight. I steamed the string beans with my tilapia and roasted sweet potato fries.

That's my first harvested acorn squash. I'll be very excited to eat it tomorrow for dinner. That small, round, dark green thing is an ornamental gourd that I grew just for fun.

It's amazing how productive that little garden is. Unlike past years, I'm making a concerted effort to not only enjoy the produce this summer, but to put some away for the depth of winter. So my freezer is already stuffed with bags of wineberries, blanched zucchini (for soups) and tomatoes, too.

Considering that I routinely buy 2 or 3 gallons of milk at a time and then freeze 2 of them, which saves me extra trips to Costco, and that I do the same with half gallons of Tropicana OJ, which I stock up on when it's on sale for $2 or $2.50, I have VERY little room left in the freezer.

But having lots of food in the house, especially food that I grew myself, makes me feel good. I feel like the ant in that fable about the grasshopper who had fun and fooled around all summer while the industrious ant worked hard to prepare for winter.

Today was an extremely productive day. Here's what I did...

1. Worked over 4 hours painting the tool shed. Here's what it looked like before I started:



I'm doing the same colors but eliminating one of the 2 trim colors; I never liked the pinkish looking color.

I only planned to do one side, but ended up doing 2 and a half sides and finished up the 3/4 of a gallon i had. So I'll have to go get more paint tomorrow.

I see there are 2 small, simple repairs I need to make, but otherwise, the tool shed that my dad built has stood up pretty well over time. I also see green mold I'll have to remove with bleach before I can paint over it. I'll do a second coat on the trim only. It's a lot of work, and much of it must be done from a ladder on a steep slope.

2. I aired out a musty smelling antique wood trunk I have in the sun. I think it helped.

3. I finished mowing the front lawn.

4. I blanched and froze those 4 zucchini in freezer bags.

I'm pooped!

It's official....I'm over the hill now.

But because my birthday is a week-long celebration, I can ruminate on my old age for seven full days.

We did the family birthday luncheon this past Sunday. On Thursday, my friend is taking me out to lunch at a very nice place in town. And today? I was supposed to walk with my friend and his dog this a.m., but my Census meeting from yesterday got rescheduled to this morning due to a tractor trailer accident that shut down the Interstate yesterday.

So we pushed back the dog walking to Thursday, leaving me with not much to do today. So I called my mother last night and she's coming over with lunch. If it's nice, we may walk, and we may hit the organic Farmer's Market and get an ice cream cone at the farm dairy.

I set a personal best for myself in July doing online surveys. I usually average about $50 a month, but in July I earned $75 from Pinecone and Toluna surveys. That was more than enough to pay for my electric bill, thank you very much!

Unfortunately, I spent about $575 more than I earned in July due to some larger expenses that all hit at the same time. I took advantage of (hopefully) somewhat lower oil prices by filling up my oil tank to the tune of $375. That usually gets me into January.

I also had a plumber come out to repair a leaking fitting on my water tank for nearly $200 (sigh). And then there was my car insurance ($210), borough tax ($165) and car tax ($90). Doesn't it sometimes seem that everyone wants a piece of your pie?

I was able to stay mostly within budget for my food bill at $204 and I spent nothing on clothing, eating out or entertainment.

I'm reading a new book called Get a Life! You Don't Need a Million to Retire Comfortably. So far I'm a little disappointed as I thought it would talk more about why you don't need a million. So far, the author's talking a lot about how to figure out what you'll do when you retire. (I have no problems there.)

Going over to mom's for a special lunch today. (More on that later in the week.)

I have a Census meeting tonight. My Census work should be over very, very soon. Like sometime this week.

I did that focus group this past Thursday. I missed my turn for a highway and stupidly went way out of my way and had to speed to try to get there on time. I was about 5 minutes late and thankfully, they hadn't started, although it was too late for me to participate int the raffle for an extra $25 for those who arrived on time! But I got my $125 and I'll try to keep that crisp $100 bill in my wallet for as long as possible before breaking it!

I now have 4 different focus group/survey places where I can try to get work. Most of these places require you to wait at least 3 or 4 months before focus groups, so knowing now about 4 different places will allow me to do more work without the long wait. Three of the places pay pretty well, while the 4th pays poorly, but it can be better than nothing.

Wrapping up the Census work this week will free up some time to weed my badly neglected gardens. Crab grass is everywhere and the place looks like a mess.

Today is my half-brother's birthday. Although my birthday comes just 2 days after his, he has never once sent me a card or called me to wish me a happy birthday. So I'm not sure I'm going to bother calling him today, and I didn't send him a card. It's never really acknowledged.

It's now impossible to walk inside my fenced vegetable garden without treading on squash vines. My tomato plants are taller than I am. (I'm 5'4".)

Yesterday, I ventured inside to tie up a few tomato branches that were being pulled down by a squash vine.

I discovered a giant cucumber hidden under all those leaves, as well as two over-sized zucchini I hadn't seen before. It's kind of like a vegetarian version of the game Hide and Go Seek.

Well, you know what that means....zucchini bread! I also picked another medium-sized tomato and a few string beans.

Here's a rundown of what's growing:

Tomatoes: Lots of green tomatoes, but thus far, just a few mid-sized tomatoes that had ripened. I could have sworn that I bought cherry tomato plants, but it appears all 5 of my plants produce a mid-sized variety of tomato.

Zucchini: This has been my best year of the last 3 for zucchini. I made a special effort to hand pollinate this year and i'm getting a lot of zucchini.

Spaghetti Squash: I think these may be able to be picked soon. They went from a greenish-white color when formed to a pale yellow now. But I'll have to check online as I've never grown these before. But I have 4, maybe 5 loaf-sized squashes...HUGE. Can't wait to try them!

Acorn squash: I just spotted one large one yesterday, but that's all so far. Guess they take a while to grow.

String beans I usually grow bush beans and get plenty of beans, but this year i decided to try pole beans. I have 2 tripod structures made of 6 foot high branches and these have been absolutely covered by the beans, but so far, lots and lots of leaves (I haven't fertilized) and very few beans. Disappointing.

Potatoes: I had great fun with potatoes last year, so this year i planted both red and russets. They appear to be dying back already; this is supposed to happen by end of August, after which time you can dig up the potatoes. I expect to have a great crop.

Ornamental gourds I planted a row of these but only 2 plants came up, I think becus I was stepping in this area while weeding and forgot I'd planted something here along the fenceline. I only noticed one small gourd; let's hope more will come.

Cucumbers Last year I had maybe 4 plants and I was awash in cucumbers. I decided to pare it down to just 2 plants this year, and now it seems I don't have ENOUGH cucumbers. I've only gotten maybe 3 or 4 at this point.

Bell pepper I've never had huge successes with bell peppers. It seems to take so long for them to really take off. Haven't gotten any peppers yet, but the plants themselves finally seem healthier, with more foliage. Of course, they're being shaded out by the squash vines, which are hard to contain and control.

I also planted some sort of vining annual flower, just to add some color and attract pollinators, but while they also got off to a slow start, they have yet to flower. Just green....

I'm off to a focus group this a.m. about an hour's drive from here. I'll return mid-day with $125 cash in my pocket.

I want to lay my new soaker hose in the garden and also head over to friend's house to continue cleanup work in her garage/house and start getting ready for her garage sale. She's basically cleaning out a lifetime of accumulated stuff. I've already gotten 2 nice lunches out of it (a bison burger at the local diner, and a shrimp caesar salad and dessert at a good Italian place).

I also need to mow the lawn!

Since the end of July is approaching, I wanted to tally up my year-to-date gross income. I anticipate remaining in the 15% tax bracket ($8,375 to $34,000) this year, and for that reason, I plan on doing a Roth IRA conversion from one of my traditional IRAs. I'll pay a lot less in taxes than if I did a conversion during a year of full employment. Given my normal salary range, I'd likely be in the 25% tax bracket.

So anyway, I can't complete the total gross for 2010 becus I have one more unemployment check coming in this week.

But I was able to tally up the total the Census Bureau reimbursed me for gas mileage from the time I started work in late April through end of July = $751. Because I always track my monthly expenses, I could see that what I actually spent on gas for my Honda during that time was just $231, and that included my usual running around doing errands and grocery shopping when not working, etc.

So I made a net PROFIT of $520 just on mileage reimbursements, on top of my Census wages! Cool!

Looks like my gross YTD income through end of July will be in the vicinity of $16,647 reportable income (with $1,490 of non-reportable income earned through surveys, focus groups and Craig's List sales).

So if my year-end income (mostly unemployment benefits) comes out to about $26,167, and factoring in about $1,900 in investment income (on a par with last year), that means I can do a Roth conversion of just $6,000 if I want to be taxed at 15% on it. I guess if I did a greater amount, that portion that runs over the 15% tax bracket, $34,000, would be taxed at the 25% tax rate. Is that right?

I had a thoroughly enjoyable afternoon running errands, mainly becus it seemed I was saving money left and right.

I had planned to hunker down at home to wait out the awful hot/humid weather today, but after reading the local paper at the library and browsing for some DVDs, I was still feeling restless, so I headed out again to run some errands.

1. Stopped at mom's to deliver about 12 oz. of fresh wineberries, picked this a.m., with strict instructions to consume immediately or freeze.

2. Filled up the gas tank at the cheapie gas station ($2.75/gallon), since it's down in the area.

3. Headed to the pricey health food store where I never shop to return a box of hair color purchased about 3 years ago! There was no expiration date, and of course i didn't have the receipt, so i was nervous that they wouldn't accept it. The guy at the register said, gee, this looks old. The only thing I can think is that the label, which had the store's name and phone number on it, was old. I cringed, afraid they wouldn't take it. He picked up the phone, as if to check with his manager, and at the same time, he said, is a store credit ok? Yes, I said quickly, and he put down the phone. Crisis averted! Score 1 for the consumer! So I got over $11 to spend on some dried papaya, dried apples and, a favorite treat, some Panda black licorice.

4. Next stop, Xpect Discounts, where I wanted to use two $1 coupons on Sunbelt granola. I was able to print out SEVEN of these coupons from online, and I already used 2 last week. I have 3 more left, and they expire end of the month, but I was afraid if I tried to use 3 or 4 at a time of the same coupon, they'd question it.

So I got the granola, plus I saw a really nice outdoor chair, the kind I've been wanting for my front door area. I usually sit on the front stoop, but it's hard and there's no back support, plus ants can walk up your leg.


It's nice to relax at day's end and survey my kingdom.

The chairs were marked $14.99. As I drove home, I said, why did the guy only charge me $8 for my total purchase?? I realized he must've read the $14.99 as $4.99. Score 2 for the consumer!!!! I saved $10!

5. Next stop, Home Depot, where I wanted to replace the 50-foot soaker hose I use in the veggie garden that sprung a big hole. (I tried first for the $5 gadget repair of the hose, but it didn't work and to try to do that repair, you have to slice the hose in half, so after bravely doing that, I now had no hose at all.)

I didn't have to pay anything for the new soaker hose, which I noted cost the same as Ace Hardware's 25-foot hose, because I used the Home Depot gift card I got when I returned the clothesline that had sat unused and unopened in my basement for several years. Score 3 for the consumer!!

I noticed, too, that the soaker hose I bought had a 7-year warranty, which made me feel good that the old hose I had was purchased about 25 years ago.

And this morning, I sold for $5 a plastic toolbox to a Craig's List guy who drove 45 minutes to get what would have cost him $11.50 new. I figure the cost of his gas pretty much negated any savings for him. Don't people think of these things???

I bought a nice piece of salmon yesterday and planned to have it for lunch today. Problem was, it's just too darn hot to heat up the kitchen.

I had me a brilliant idea. Carry my little convection oven (not much bigger than a toaster oven) downstairs and into the garage and cook it in there.

Hey, people grill outdoors all the time, so what's wrong with a few mouse traps, paint cans and dirty stuff all around the oven?

I laid out some tinfoil and lined the tray with it, then placed the yummy salmon filet on top, sprinkling some rosesmary on it. I placed it inside the oven and carried it down into the basement that way. As I stepped through the doorway from the basement to the garage, I somehow lost my balance, the oven door flew open and that darned salmon filet went flying, landing on my FILTHY DIRTY garage floor.

Well, we're not going to waste a perfectly good $7 piece of salmon. I brought it back upstairs to the kitchen, where I rinsed off the dust and grit.

Back into the oven it went, where it's broiling now.

I'm really pretty careful about how I spend my money. Still, there are occasions when I end up buying something and never using it. I may have intentions of returning it, but maybe at the time I figure it's a small purchase and not worth a special trip.

Well, I recently started noticing that all those little unused purchases were popping up around my house, and so I recently began returning things to stores for a refund or credit. All these purchases were made over a year ago (!) and I didn't have the receipt, but most retailers these days will process the return.

Here are a few examples:

1. Retractable clothesline. I had one I loved and used often, but it broke. I went to Lowe's for a replacement, but they were out. I found one at Home Depot a few weeks later, and snatched it up, even though I had already switched over to collapsible folding racks in the driveway. Still, I was so attached to this particular product that I held onto it, "in case I needed it." Well, I finally realized I really didn't need it, several years later. I was able to return it to Home Depot with no receipt for $17! Cool.

2. Bow saw. My trusty old bow saw got stuck in a tree limb I was trying to cut up. The weight of the branch slowly separating as I cut it locked up the saw and would not let go. There was nothing to do but buy a new bow saw to free the old one. I figured the blade on the old one was dull anyway. I bought a new one at Wal-Mart for $5. Well, that new blade was so thin it actually wobbled as I used it, resulting in a curved cut. Very cheap product. After freeing my first bow saw, I threw the new one in the garage, disgusted, but later realized I could probably return it and get my money back. And I did.

3. A gallon of ammonia. A friend of mine promised to help me seal off my basement to mice. He gave me a laundry list of supplies to buy before his arrival. One of those supplies was a gallon of ammonia, which in hindsight would appear to be a useless/pointless mice deterrent. It irked me that my friend completely failed to show up, and I had that gallon of ammonia sitting on the laundry shelf for over a year. Luckily, it was the Shop Rite generic brand, so I marched over there and got $2 and change.

4. Hair color.I purchased a special brand of hair color at a health food store years ago when I wanted to get away from using peroxide on my hair. But after reading the directions, I realized it wasn't going to work for me. That product sat in my linen closet for years. Luckily, the price tag has the store name on it so a return should not be a problem.

In other money news, I've also return to selling stuff on Craig's List after a few months' hiatus.

I reposted 7 or 8 things that haven't yet sold. One was a plastic Stanley toolbox an old boyfriend gave me. One Xmas he got 2 of them, so he'd given the spare one to me. But I have no need for a toolbox, so I checked the price of a new one at the Stanley website and included a link showing the $11 price in the Craig's List posting where I am just asking $5 for a quick sale. I got a taker, and he's coming over tomorrow for it.

I also got a taker, hopefully, on an old 300 mm camera lens I bought 25 years ago. It cost a lot of money but I hardly ever used it. I'm asking just $90 for something I spent several hundred on, but I will be thrilled to have converted this particular item to cash as I hadn't thought anyone would still want it. I've gone totally digital.

I hope to meet that buyer next week when I'm down in his area for a focus group that will pay me $125 (tax-free) cash for 2.5 hours of my opinions on groceries.

I'm still working for the Census. I'm in week 12 of what was originally said to be a 6 or 8 week assignment.

The Census work has been a godsend for me. Normally, after a layoff, I would fall back on my freelance real estate copywriting. But of course, the current real estate slump means very little work has come my way. I lucked out in that i happened to be laid off in the once-every-10th year they do a census, so all my census work has really made up for the loss of income from the freelance writing. I've grossed $5,200 from it so far.

I got called for Jury Duty, something that's never happened to me while I was unemployed. Surprisingly, they continue to pay unemployment benefits, but only for the first 5 days of jury duty. After that, if you're so unlucky as to be selected, they reduce your benefits to 75% of your normal amount. Note to self: make sure I get disqualified for Jury Duty.

Same old, same old.

Still living with minimal spending.

Today, though, will be a treat. After my morning census meeting (God, i hate them, they drag on for over an hour while you sit there waiting for them to review your completed surveys....), my friend and neighbor is taking me out to lunch at a favorite Italian restaurant in town.

It's the 2nd lunch and "thank you" for my help in clearing out her garage, which is still far from done. I think I've been there 5 times now, usually 2 or 3 hours at a time, hauling books to donate to the library (probably about 12 boxes), loading and then unloading trash at the landfill, and lots of heavy lifting since she's way out of shape.

I don't mind it too much, though this weather sucks. Strangely, I do get a great deal of satisfaction out of decluttering, even if it's someone else's stuff!. (Perhaps a new career direction for me?)

In garden news, I smelled a bad smell in an area of my yard north of the house. I've smelled that smell before...dead animal smell. It didn't take long for me to discover one big, and yes, quite dead, woodchuck, probably 8 feet from one of the three woodchuck burrows on my property.

It was gross. Flies were buzzing around it. I couldn't tell how it died becus i didn't really want to examine it closely. But I'm wondering, since I saw that coyote puppy in the same area just a week ago, if coyotes and the woodchuck crossed paths.

The thing stinks. I don't even feel like going near it to toss dirt on it. Gross.

Part of me feels a little sorry for its short-lived life, but another part of me is glad becus that darn woodchuck kept munching my black-eyed susies, my astilbes and my autumn joy sedums, which I'd planted becus they were impervious to deer.

So...I'm hoping that's the only area woodchuck and that I could even be woodchuck-free for the rest of this season. Could I be so lucky?

I'm wrapping up my 10th week of Census work. I'm maybe averaging 4 hours a day, but with the mileage reimbursement, it does add up so that I gross about $100 or so a day. But I'm with my fourth crew now and these 2 crew leaders really take forever. The Census meetings occur daily, and you're forced to sit through an inquisition-like process where they study each survey you're handing in and question you closely, sometimes handing it back to you for further investigating if they don't think it will pass muster with higher-ups. It gets very, very frustrating. Why should it take over an hour for them to review 4 surveys?

With this crazy heat and frequent thunderstorms, it's been tougher finding time to go out. I typically don't head out until about 4 p.m. or even 5 pm becus i know i'll catch more people home. But if it's hot, i don't feel like going out at all.

Current garden pickings include zucchini and wineberries, which grow in abundance in the back of my property. How much I pick is limited only by my energy level on a given day.

I've picked about 12 cups of wineberries so far, rinsing, air drying and then freezing most of them for winter use on my breakfast cereal. The season is brief, lasting only a few weeks.

I believe I'm up to about 8 or 9 zucchinis picked, with many given away.

There are 4 or 5 spaghetti squash like the first image above forming like fat loaves of bread on the hay. They can't be picked until they mature in the fall and turn yellow. Right now, they're a virginal shade of white.

I'm waiting (not so patiently) for tomatoes, string beans, acorn squash, cucumbers and potatoes.

Like last year, I'm tracking everything I harvest so that I can ultimately estimate with a fair degree of accuracy the retail value of my organic produce, based on what Shop Rite would charge for the equivalent in the store.

Thank god for today's rain; it was so needed. My soaker hose, which allows water to trickle into the ground slowly instead of splashing the leaves, inviting disease, burst a small pinhole into a much bigger hole. I bought a repair kit but haven't gotten around to using it yet. I also had a plumber over here today to fix a leaky fitting on my water tank, which supplies the well water for my outdoor water use. (It doesn't supply drinking water anymore as it's a shallow well and i have since hooked up to municipal water supply.) The bill was $192. Ouch. But now I can water my garden again without that well pump cycling on and off every 2 minutes.

The season's first zucchini.



Plenty more where that came from. (I picked 2 more this morning.)



And these are spaghetti squashes forming.



This afternoon I start training (1 day) for the next round of Census work, which I understand largely consists of "reworking" residences previously enumerated as "vacant" or uninhabitable."

Dealing With the Heat

Haven't done a whole heck of a lot these last 5 days, due to the heat wave. It was 98 yesterday and very high humidity each day. I dragged a chaise lounge down to the dank basement and sat there reading and talking to my cats. Then I studied the long workbench I have, painted a dark green many years ago. I also observed the many cans of half used paint sitting on the workbench.

I grabbed a paint can dated 1/96 and painted the workbench white. Much better, though it could use a second coat.

Yesterday morning at 8 a.m. I helped my neighbor clean out her garage, 2nd day of doing so. She went through about 5 boxes of boxes which she agreed to donate to the library. I carried them in for her, and then we disposed of other stuff at the dump. It feels so good to de-clutter, even when it's not my stuff!

An Unintended Consequence of the Cash for Clunkers Program

I got my car tax bill for about $85. One of the small rewards of driving an older car is tht each year you keep it, your car tax is smaller. The car tax is based on 70% of the car's retail value, derived from nada.com website, multiplied by the mill rate. But I noticed the car tax this year was actually HIGHER than what I paid last year, by about $5. That can't be right, I thought. If anything, it should be less.

The tax assessor gave me an interesting explanation for that. The federal Cash for Clunkers program resulted in thousands of older gas guzzlers being taken off the road when they would have otherwise been sold to other people. This resulted in the value of other older cars, like mine, increasing! Damn.

Keeping cool has been uppermost on my mind the last few days, and will continue to be top of mind for all of this week, judging by the forecast.

Right now, at 2:30 pm, it's 92 outside in the shade, 76 downstairs in my house and about 80 upstairs. Being central AC-less, I have an assortment of towels, sheets and small blankets covering my windows. The house has a cave-like quality to it now.

Had lunch with mom yesterday. She made a yummy sockeye salmon salad over lettuce with an absolutely, knock-down delicious potato and beet salad. You might not think beets go with potatoes, but they do. One key was serving it at room temperature. It had so much more flavor.

I was going to hit Shop-Rite after lunch with her, but after that wall of heat hit me when I left her place, I wilted and headed home.

I next planned to get groceries early this a.m., around 8 a.m., before the heat got too bad. This, too, failed to get me out of the house.

Now, I have a haircut scheduled for 5 pm today, down by the mall, so I can surely hit Shop-Rite on my way home.

I was worried about Waldo, who was throwing up last night. He had a hairball, but I wondered if heat stroke might also be part of it, as he was lying on the floor of my upstairs closet and panting. He didn't eat or drink until this a.m. He has eaten very little, but at least he's rehydrated himself.



So I caved in and dragged down the small window AC from the attic and put in in my upstairs bedroom, the hottest room in the house, not counting the upstairs bathroom. I can't run it during the day becus the sun beats down on it, but I've closed the door to that room off so the cats can't go in there to sleep. They're creatures of habit, but as I said, it's the hottest room of the house. It's much cooler downstairs in the center of the house. I also closed doors to all my upstairs rooms except office, and also the sun room and the family room downstairs. Those rooms heat up quickly becus they have so many windows. I also got my thermal floor length curtain out and put them up on the family room French doors. I usually use them during winter, but I figure this will also insulate heat exchange through the glass doors.

I've been hand pollinating my squashes and am thrilled to pieces to see several cute zucchini and several spaghetti squash forming on the plants. The first zucchini will be ready to be picked in another day or two. Lots of green tomatoes. Many flowers, but no fruit forming on the cucumber plants and i see no acorn squash forming, either. Pole beans are just now getting their flower buds.

Did I tell you the Census Bureau has called, inquiring whether I wanted to work in "the next phase of the operation." The caller couldn't tell me what the work would entail; I'm hoping it's not more door-to-door chasing after residents, but regardless, of course I said yes. It requires one more day of training, which is this Thursday.

I spent an enjoyable day and overnight at my dad's in New Jersey during the week, with plenty of time to get back home before any holiday traffic.

I had read an article in the New York Times about public gardens in New Jersey, and they highlighted one in the NJ Pine Barrens that sounded interesting. It's on the campus of Georgian Court University, which purchased the property and grounds from the heirs of a millionaire RR tycoon, Charles Gould.

Since I am a fan of Japanese gardens, it seemed intriguing, so after my arrival at dad's and lunch at a local cafe, we headed for Lakewood NJ.

There were lots of statuary of Greek gods, ornate benches and urns used as planters and many fountains, but they were all drained. They only turn the water on for special occasions, I guess as a water conservation measure. That was too bad. The grass was the color of straw and parched dry.

If you'd like to see some pix of my visit, you can check out my other blog at: http://owlhollownews.blogspot.com/2010/07/visit-tot-he-arboretum-at-georgian.html

But here's a sampling of the Japanese garden:



This am i spent a few hours helping a friend clean out her garage, which has been packed with her mother's stuff for 5 years. She took me to lunch afterwards as a thank you, so that was fun.

Didn't do much else today except take an evening walk and sweep the driveway.

I don't see my job situation improving anytime soon. So I don't feel in control of my income. But I can still control my expenses.

Next in my sights for cutting expenses was cutting my cable TV. All I get is basic, but it's still $25 each and every month. I knew that by cutting it, I'd end up reading more (never a bad thing) and I could still watch the occasional free movie whenever I liked by picking up a free flick at the library. I even checked out hulu.com to make sure I could watch my favorite TV shows there. (I can.) And I figured I could return to my old habit of getting my news from public radio.

So, after much back and forth and a great deal of angst (how could I not watch my beloved American Idol?), I called Charter Communications and announced I wanted to end my cable service. When he asked why, I simply told him I didn't think I was getting a lot for my money.

Without hesitating, he offered me a "promo" rate of $13 a month, a 45% decrease from what I'm currently paying. The promo rate is good for a year and at the end of that year, he advised me to call them back and see what other promo rate they might have going on at that time.

Geez. I could have done this 10 years ago and saved myself a bundle. I was elated and ticked off at the same time! Elated, because I wouldn't have to go TV Cold Turkey and I could still lower my bill by nearly half each month. Ticked off becus they don't make promo rates known to customers until they're ready to cancel.

TV service is a very competitive business, just like phone and Internet services. If you're not happy with what you're paying for cable, you have many options these days. And I guess that's working in the customer's favor. It makes you wonder just how much profit they are making on you when it still makes business sense to retain a customer at half the charge they used to collect.

So, if you think you're paying too much for cable, pick up the phone and call them. You just may be surprised at their response.

I purchased 2 elephant ear bulbs at Wal-Mart this spring for the first time. Not sure what luck I'd have. For a very long time, only one bulb produced anything...one leaf, to be exact.



I loved the way it looked. So tropical.

More recently, the 1st elephant ear has sprouted a second leaf, even larger than the first.



That second leaf is enormous!



I can't wait to see what it looks like in August! It thrives on this summer heat.

Meanwhile, Round 2 of the basil is coming up nicely. (The first batch is already bolting.)



I finished reading How to Retire Happy, Wild & Free. I didn't think the book was written very well, or well-organized, but I still got a few things out of it.


A good investment.

1. Two loads of wash, hang dried.

2. My (hopefully) last Census meeting, to sign some paperwork.

3. A torque check after getting my tires rotated.

4. Some groceries at Shop Rite.

5. Got a pork shoulder in the slow cooker and it's been cooking all day long. Dinner tonight: Pulled pork sandwiches with barbecue sauce, my homemade potato salad and homegrown salad. Fabulous......

6. Weeding

7 Talk with pseudo step-mom on the phone.

8. Mailed a package at UPS.

9. Homemade pizza for lunch featuring goat cheese, onions, garlic, olive oil, spinach and fresh basil.

10. I posted an ad on Craig's List looking for a male kayaking partner and I got 3 responses. One lives too far away and I responded to the other 2 as well. One may have lost interest becus i told him I wasn't interested in anything romantic. We'll see. And I'll be careful. Meet for coffee first.

It's really uncomfortably hot and humid here today. I checked my thermostat and it was 78 downstairs, 85 upstairs, but that doesn't account for the dew point.

I find that when I'm physically uncomfortable, due to either very warm conditions in summer or too chilly of a heat setting in winter, I don't do a whole heck of a lot. It's just that now, instead of huddling under a blanket to keep warm, I'm walking around the house half naked and getting nothing done.

Well, I did write the June blog for my real estate company client. And I had what could be my last Census meeting for a while, or for good. Hard to say, it could be just a brief hiatus until the 2nd week of July, or it could be finally the end of it. I'm not sure I want to do any more "cleanup" work for them anyway, it's more of a hassle than anything else. And yeah, I did some mowing and came upon a large, black dead mole, no doubt one of the clan who's been tearing up my lawn. I also saw a dead mouse in the driveway the other day, the second such mouse in the last few weeks.

Oh, and I am crazy upset...the carpenter ants are back. SIGH. There's always a population explosion of ants after a lot of rain, and we did have a fair amount last night. It filled the bird bath, anyway. If I stand in my kitchen with its white cabinets, white counter tops and white back splash, I can spot 3 or 4 at a time, in different locations, but all mostly on the back wall. They must be coming in somewhere else other than behind the upper cabinets becus I still have Arm & Hammer toxic dryer sheets stuffed up there. (As you may know, I lauded the effectiveness of these dryer sheets as a chemical-laden ant deterrent in a recent post.)

Every time I go into the kitchen I look for ants, and try to see the entry spot(s). It occurred to me earlier today that one possibility is the recessed light fixture above the kitchen sink. Sure enough, I spotted an ant crawling around the CFL bulb. After killing it and feeling desperate, I took yet another A&H dryer sheet and crammed it into the spiral CFL bulb. Have to remember not to use that light fixture as I can imagine how much more awful the smell will be when heated even slightly. I will have to see if that helps.

I was so absolutely thrilled for the past few months because those dryer sheets seemed really effective, eliminating all but maybe 5% of my problem. I sprinkled more ant bait around the exterior house foundation. That works, more or less, though there's a delayed reaction of a few days. Though I've noticed when sprinkling inside the house, which I am very cautious about doing due to the cats, that ants have walked right by the bait with a complete lack of interest (or hunger).

Sadly, I let 4 or 5 small lettuce heads go to waste in the garden. I planned to give it to Frank, who chain sawed a fallen tree for me, but he's not a salad guy. I had mentioned that to my mother, so she didn't put i dibs for it. And I forgot to pick it, so now it's done gone bolted. I think I've counted 15 large salads I've consumed, so I did pretty well. The basil is also going to flower, but this year I was smart and planted some from seed, so they are just now looking promising while the old plants I'll let go to seed and maybe try saving the seeds for next year if they dry well.

Today's the last day of my week long frugal fast.

OK, I spent some money:

1. Filled up the gas tank, a necessity for my census work.

2. Yesterday, I got some cat food at Wal-Mart. I was near by after finishing up Census work so it wouldn't have made sense to make a separate trip next week. Wal-Mart has the cheapest Fancy Feast even at its regular price of .48 a can; they've had a "rollback" for a while now and it's just .30 a can.

The frugal fast still served a purpose in making me more conscious of my spending. I feel good that during a week's time I only spent on cat food and gas.

Today, my new friend Frank is stopping by with his chain saw to cut up a fallen crabapple tree. I'll stack the wood with the other wood already collected from the tree in my driveway and try to trade it as firewood on Craig's List for something else (plants?) Too bad I didn't have a fireplace. Otherwise, I can give it to my dad next time I see him.

After Frank finishes up here this a.m., I'll head out to do more Census work today. It will probably take less than an hour to go through my assigned addresses. After that, I think I'll pick up a few groceries, mainly fruit, at Xpect Discounts. And if I can find my other Fancy Feast coupons, I'll go back to Wal-Mart for more cat food.

That's the dangerous thing about me and coupons. I always collect them, but seem to lose them easily so I can't find them when I want to use them. I often keep them in my glove compartment box in the car, or on the dining room table, but sometimes they end up in stray places.

While out, I"ll also return a book I finished reading (Eckhart Tolle) which I really didn't get a lot out of. Way over my head. I ordered 3 books at the library through their statewide loan system; i would have thought I'd have gotten one of them by now. I really want to read The Ultimate Cheapskate's Road Map to True Riches and also, How to Retire Happy, Wild and Free. Sounds like my kind of book!

Forgot to tell you about the investment seminar I attended this past week with my friend. Mainly for the free dinner. (smile) I won't be investing with David Lerner. They engaged us in small talk and once I told them I was out of work, they pretty much left us alone for the rest of the night. (smile) They were pushing two types of investments: tax-free muni bonds and their own REIT. The dinner was ok, but not as good as the Teva Neuroscience dinners I've attended.

Unemployed:9 months and counting.

Income sources during that time:Unemployment benefits, Census work, freelance writing, market research studies, medical research studies, online surveys.

Personal savings spent: $0

Not bad, all things considered, but I'm also looking ahead and wondering what the heck's gonna happen if I'm still out of work by year's end. I'm deferring a variety of expenditures (some routine healthcare and doc visits, plus home maintenance) and I can't do that forever.

Right now, I feel I have more control over my expenses than I do income.

So what's next on the chopping block?

1.Cell phone.The savings aren't as much as you might think since this is a prepaid cell phone that costs me just $100 a year. I regret not ending this back in April before I renewed my minutes, but after having already done so, I'll just go ahead and use it and will lose the cell phone service when I don't renew next April 2011.

2.AAA membership. $90 a year. I've had this for a few years, never used it and since I'm not commuting anywhere, it seems unnecessary to maintain. I can always renew (at a slightly higher rate) when/if I get a job.

The above 2 items are no-brainers which I regret not having already eliminated, but I guess at the time I wasn't feeling a crisis was approaching.

What else can I cut from the budget? These next two would be very hard for me to do, but neither are "essential."

1.Cable TV: At $25 a month, this could save me $300 a year. This would be hard, very hard. I watch TV daily, usually during breakfast to catch the morning news and weather, and then again at night.

I considered ditching cable and getting unlimited Netflix at less than half the price ($9), but I really like my TV shows. Watching movies wouldn't really fill that void.

2. Internet:I pay $20 a month for slow-as-molasses DSL from AT&T, and so I'd save $250 a year if I dropped it and used the computer at the library instead. I doubt I'd do this since it would be hugely inconvenient to conduct a job search, check email or do my freelance work at the library.

What else is there to cut?

Not a whole lot.

Of course, I'll keep trying to be frugal with utilities like electricity, water, sewer and heating oil (there's also my dump permit at $80 and annual sewer loan assessment of $600) but those bills will always remain unless I move into a tent.

I recently looked into refinancing (again) my small mortgage, which I could actually pay off in full if I wanted, but even with ample cash reserves, the credit union I checked with said that my being unemployed could be an issue and couldn't guarantee I'd get the refinance deal, so I'm reluctant to possibly blow $300 to apply.

COBRA is still an affordable $178.50/month through year's end. Still, I've avoided having ANY doctor's visits these past 9 months and have only ordered my 2 current prescriptions. By summer's end I'll be down to just 1 prescription. (And I can't wait!!!)

Obviously things like eating out, entertainment and clothing have been off the table for a while, though I admit I'm not perfect. I'm only getting my hair cut once every 2 months ($19 with tip).

Most of my gardening/yard work expenses have been limited to my vegetable garden, which is providing me with food.

Cat food has been a huge new expense for me, partly becus I now have 2 cats, not one, and also becus I committed myself to feeding them healthier food, meaning canned food, not dry. My other cat ate dry food exclusively and I couldn't get her off it. I did the research and the consensus is clearly that dry food is crap. However, I'm spending a LOT of money on Fancy Feast, about $80 a month, and I've started letting Luther have one of his 3-4 meals daily be dry. Waldo still gets only wet food becus I'm still not sure if he has kidney disease and dry food would aggravate that condition.

I've had no work done on the car and it's due now for at least an oil change. The car's 11 years old and I want to keep it going for several more years since it only has 112,000 miles on it.

My car insurance is pretty cheap ($350/hr) but my homeowner's is not, so I'll DEFINITELY shop around when I get my next premium bill.

Any suggestions for shaving expenses still further?

Off to a running start on the 3rd day of the week-long Frugal Fast.

No undue hardships to report! I worked a good part of yesterday doing Census work, so no real opportunity (or desire) to spend money, though I could have stopped in at Wal-Mart for more cat food, since I was in the area.

I agree with Mom Cents, who was, I think, the person who said the point of the Frugal Fast is not so much for me to "save" money as to make myself more conscious of how and when I do spend money.

Honestly, sometimes I think it would be difficult to make myself any more aware of my spending habits than I am now, since being unemployed has a way of magnifying every spending decision. Still, I think the Fast is a good exercise and I would like to see this through and prove to myself that I can refrain from spending for an entire week.

These days, my routine expenditures are simply gas for the car and groceries. I am disciplined 80% of the time; during the other 20% of the time, I am tempted to buy jewelry or clothing I see on online shopping channels. At other times, I feel like eating out.

I nearly forgot. Today's the first day of the weeklong Frugal Fast. Momcents, Ima and Scottish girl, don't forget!

I shouldn't have any trouble complying today. My gas tank is less than half full, but today will be fine.

I put in about 5 hours of work for the Census yesterday, at a higher end apartment complex in small nearby city. for the week, I eeked out 15 hours of work, plus I'll make money from the gas mileage reimbursement. It's better than nothing, for sure.

I'll put in a few hours of Census work today and tomorrow, but not sure how productive I'll be. These apartments, seven separate buildings, all have a locked main door and buzzers for each apartment. If no one happens to be leaving and lets you in, there's no way you can even leave a notice of your visit with your contact info, and I've found people find it easier to blow off the census survey when you're at the other end of the intercom, not face to face.

I canvassed probably 30 or so residences yesterday and was able to complete just 7 surveys. Back again to try today. The census work is getting old (rejection wears thin after a while), but it's money, and shouldn't last much longer anyway. At least I'm in a safe neighborhood.

Yesterday I fell asleep after getting home from census work but woke up and was able to squeeze in some stuff I wanted to do: make more homemade iced tea (I drink it by the gallon and it's a combo of black, green and white tea), change the hummingbird water, trim the 3 shrubs on the back patio and sweep the back patio. I love the look of bricks but I get a lot of weeds between them so it's quite high maintenance, and once the weeds take hold, sweeping is harder. I have lots of poison ivy sprouting up in one area but no sense spraying til Tuesday with all the rain that's forecast.

My mom was all excited after attending an annual big fundraiser for Hospice. As an artist who donated some work for the auction, she got in free; normally tickets are $150 each. She's gone every year for the past 13 years. She was happy because she sold 3 or 4 big pieces, grossing $1,400, but after Hospice gets its cut, she nets about $800. Still great for my mom on a fixed income. Plus the food is always to die for; it's quite the gala event and all her friends go there.