Repeat of last trip. Up to near Tulsa, drop and hook and back to the casino truck stop for the night, where I"m at now, up early am and back home early.  I would like not to have a repeat of that idiot in the car starting trouble with me.  

Regardless, yet another phone call - endless supply of them on a daily basis - from an Arizona number, I mostly ignore them.  Or I answer and make funny noises.  I'm through with asking them to stop calling me, they won't. It's been going on for years now.  The only thing that has worked is having the kids answer the phone or just making up gibberish type noises that are nothing but made up words that have no real meaning.  

Hooloooloooo stonatons papoppum stoons, sir.  Pee poppum spooms.  As I said, utter gibberish, more like madman stuff lmao.  I'm getting less and less of the calls lol.  Anyway, I took this call off of a whim and was glad I took it. 

Cardinal Finance - it's a nationwide lender, big company I found out after Googling it and been around a while.  I applied for a cash-out loan with them a few weeks ago - but I never finished the application. It got to the part where you have to give your social security number and I instantly got a bit apprehensive.  I don't like giving that number out.  Call me old school, but that number was never intended to be an identification number that everyone wants nowadays in order to check your credit and such. 

Too much abuses can become of giving out that number.  So, a rep called me today.  That's the point where I decided to Google them and see if they are legit. Now, it's not like they called first or anything. I was looking on my CreditKarma account and this was the highest one on the list for refi options.  I've acquired several personal loans off of Credit Karma - they have the best rates I can find and approval every time without a lot of hassle.  Plus they already have my info I don't really have to fill out too much.  

Anyway, the man wanted to run my credit score so I begrudgingly allowed it - it's another thing I don't like to have done too often. A hard check of your credit stays on your report up to two years and tho it doesn't take out that many points, it looks bad if you have too many of them.  They start thinking you are desperate and need the extra credit to pay for everyday things and such.  Or something like that, lol.  Anyway, long, long story shortened.  Cause he needed a lot of information - they always do, just went through this garbage with the land loan.  

The interest rate is locked in a 2.3 percent. That is awesome in case you don't keep up with things like that.  I don't want just a refi but if I did, I would definitely take it.  No, if this didn't come with the cash out option, I wasn't taking the deal. I told the guy right upfront this is a manufactured home.  What he came back with about blew my mind: as long as the appraisal is good, you can get up to 90k cash. Yup, I'm taking the risk and spending the money.  It is what it is.  This RV park will work - or it won't - but I'm believing it's going to pay for itself and make a decent profit.  It might not happen right away after it opens, but who knows.  

Remember the last time I had to wait on an appraisal, for the land loan? lol.  I dunno how long it's taking to get them done in Arizona and it's a house, not land.  

Zestimate is $276,700.  Zestimate range is $243,000 to $307,000. Is any of that anywhere near accurate? I have no idea.  I do know that finding comps in my neighborhood is literally impossible.  The rest of the homes there are old - ooooollllllddddd- home excepting the site built homes.  Those are worth more than mine and there are a handful of them. Zoning in the city doesn't say you can't build a regular house there.  But the rest of it is old, aluminum sided mobile homes with metal roofs for the most part. Even the ones with shingle roofs are 25 years  old or older.  

So it will be interesting to see how this appraisal company is going to come up with comps. When I got the new house, they had to go look at comps in completely different neighborhoods many miles away.  Redfin has the house valued at 120k lmao.  Sure! And it has a picture of the old house that burned down in 2007!  Yea, if they're going by that house, it might be worth that just because of the red hot housing market. This is what I'm trying to take advantage of, the housing market in Phoenix is through the roof, it's a seller's paradise.  

That's the pic Redfin has on their site.  I haven't seen a pic of the old house in ages, I don't even know if I have any.  That's the house that burned down.  The entire property is completely different now.  I mean, totally different.  Some memories there, tho.  And a lifetime' worth of nostalgic items burned.  Memorabilia, burned. A huge stash of photos of my son as he was growing up - gone.  I'll never forget the day it burned down. Sunday morning, my son sleeping next to the wall where the flames literally burst out - he would have been burned alive and I doubt he would have lived through it.  Michael basically saved his life.  He came to the bathroom, pounding on the door, yelling at me that there was smoke in the house. I was about to take a shower.  I got my clothes back on and in a hurry ran out, saw the smoke, got my son out of bed and everyone else for that matter, and out of the house.

I was trying to get some items that I would truly miss (worthless to anyone else, only had meaning to me)  if they burned up and when I went to go back into my bedroom, kabaam! And that wall burst out, flames shooting out of it - right where my son had just been sleeping a few minutes earlier.  I was halfway down the hallway and the heat from that burst of flames was unbearable, I ran out of the house.

It's a long story, but that photo brings back those memories. We were truly blessed that no one was hurt that day - but at the same time, my life became a living hell for a while, literally had to go buy new clothing, all of it was gone.  I didn't even have a shirt on.....

Anyways, maybe Zillow has that thing listed way too high - but I doubt it's that far off.  Old junky homes in that neighborhood are selling for 120k and more.  Location is everything. 10 minutes from downtown Phoenix, the only affordable option left in the region for people wanting to leave near downtown, it's an old neighborhood.  Houses - regular site built houses -in nearby neighborhoods start at 300k and go well up from there.  The fact of the matter is, not much sells in my neighborhood because people couldn't afford to live anywhere else in the city.  Or neighboring cities.  The ones that do sell, the people dump money into them and fix them up or replace it with a regular house.  

Enough of that. It will be weeks before I hear back what the appraisal comes up with. 

I was in Kroger's on Sunday - morningish - I was buying some ingredients for dinners we are making this week. I went by the manager's specials meat shelves - which have been empty every time I've gone in there the last several months - and saw a huge number of packages of thick smoked bacon. What?!!

No one was even at the manager's special area, I went over there and looked at one.  1.25 pound packages for $2.99 a pound!  Expiration date was is the 6th of December.  I don't care about that, it would alllllll be frozen.  I started grabbing them and chucking them into my basket.  They don't have limits on that stuff, first come, first served. Everyone else ignoring it, their loss.  

I felt eyes on me.  What's going on here? some random stranger asked.  I ignored him, still grabbing the packages.  Other people started chiming in.  What's the deal, I thought?  This stuff has been sitting here and it takes some dude grabbing them for them to notice it? The manager's special bay is at the same place, every time. They don't move it around the store, lol, if you are interested in such things, LOOK AT IT when you go in there.  I look every single time I go into that store. I don't have to be getting anything even on that aisle and I'll still go over and look.

It was a gold mine for me. I grabbed 18 of them and then decided that all of these people that were lusting after the bacon could have the few that were left.  I was going to take ALL of them.  Chicken and chorizo in there as well, I grabbed some of that for freezing when I got home. 

I can safely say the freezers are literally full.  I also got another prime rib roast - amazingly they still had some. They usually sell out by thanksgiving. Inflation - they weren't exactly the greatest price, but a prime rib roast on a random, non-holiday day?  Amazing.  I've got 4 of those.  I didn't score on turkeys this year save one.  It's in the freezer, they were really high priced. And hams weren't too great on the price, either, I just got one this year for the Thanksgiving feast. I normally would get a couple of them and freeze them as well.  

I saved $50 on that visit to the store and that doesn't include the savings on the bacon. The savings for manager's specials won't show up on the receipt, as the checkout clerk asserted, you saved a LOT more than this with that bacon!  We do like our bacon.  Inflation be damned, there will be months worth of bacon available.  This is the way I do it.  See it on sale? Something we eat regularly, frequently, often or even just here and there? Buy as much of it as they allow.  Another freezer will be coming soon.  It will also be filled up. Freezers don't cost much to run - if they are full.  The frozen stuff helps keep it cold and the compressor doesn't have to come on that much.  

I'm going full out on this.  I'm putting in an order for seeds for a huge variety of vegetables tomorrow.  We started growing some stuff this year for the fun of it, but if any of these "experts" that are predicting an elongated period of inflation are correct, I want the option to grow veggies on the new property.  Plenty of land, folks, plenty of space to put in a small patch for a dozen or more different varieties of vegetable plants.  

What are they predicting? Food shortages on a global theater and giving numerous reasons why, much of it tied to inflation and the cost of farming, especially hard on family farms.  Seeds are not a huge investment, they don't cost that much.  I'd like to see a vegetable patch going regardless of economic downturns and hyperinflation, it's fun to watch stuff grow.  It's also fun to eat and not be hungry : )

No, I'm not fretting over the economy or inflation. It's hurting a lot of people tho.  I just don't want to be hungry. And even if it never happens, it still saves a bundle of money.  40 pounds of this, 35 pounds of that when it's on sale.  Maybe I should just buy a side of beef for the next freezer, butcher wrapped.....

I like to keep challenges in my life.  The Biden administration is offering plenty. He doesn't give a damn about the flood of illegals coming in and apparently making reparations to them....Afghanistan....inflation - they are totally disconnected from that, they are all rich and don't give a s***.....New Covid strain- gee, let's get MORE vax shots!! ---- this dude is easily, IMO, the worst President that has ever occupied the White House, far worse than even Carter - and his polling numbers show it.  

But whatever. Y'all wanted this dude, you are now paying for it, you are literally paying for it and if that 5 trillion reconciliation bill goes through? Y'all gonna lose your minds with the taxation that is coming YOUR way.  "Anyone but Trump" didn't quite work out that well for ya, did it? Oh, and if that bill goes through? You think inflation is bad now? Oh, my peoples, are you in for the rudest of awakenings....

G'nite.