I have great relief that I have finally settled the issue with Capital One, have the account WAY back down and don't have to worry about that little gem anymore. Note that I didn't say I was dumping the card - I gave them a lump sum and they took off a bunch of fees. HIGH fees at that.
My great plans for the weekend: not much.
Buy a gallon of paint and some caulking - this is Mary's latest project, filling in the cracks in the bathroom and repainting the walls with semi-gloss.
I am going to finish that fencing project. The problem I have run into is simply that I don't have a good enough drill to drill 2 more holes in one of the posts. I'm going to figure out something else to deal with the problem, which is a gap between the pole and the wall of the house that is big enough for me Dane/Leopard dog mix to get through. I have a temp fix right now, I want a permanent solution.
My tree I bought at the auction is blooming full tilt at this point - it's covering itself with leaves and it's looking pretty darn good : ) Weeds are starting to infiltrate the front yard now - due to the neighbors who do nothing but let weeds grow and grow and grow, I'm hoping this week the city will come out and issue them a warning. Actually, I'd rather they issue them a citation - they let the weeds grow all the time.
Anyway, I'm sighing big relief that the weather has cooled back down to the point that AC should not be needed. If the forecast is correct, at least the next 7 days are looking cool enough for no AC use.
Just stopping in - I'm on my way out the door with the dogs for that hike I promised them yesterday and am forcing myself to do today (as in: I don't really feel like it, fortunately the dogs ALWAYS feel like it!).
Happy Saturday!
ben
Saturday, March 7, 2009
Friday, March 6, 2009
Friday
Trying to figure out where this day went......
Nice to be busy again.
This morning's run was in the semi and was WAY out east. Highway 79 into Florence, well the outskirts of Florence, and then get on this unmaintained road called Price road.
The road was horrible. I had to drive at least 10 miles on this dirt, crappy road full of rocks, shaking the truck the entire way, even though I was only going like 10MPH. It was nice out there, though, all farmland in a small, hidden valley. It's funny to see stuff like that you never knew existed. The contractor was installing irrigation pipe. I got to go pet some horses and take in the fresh air and pleasant views - it took them quite a long time to get the truck unloaded - a LONG time.
There was only one way that I could have gotten the semi into that place - back down a steep embankment into a farm field. The entrance to the place I was delivering to has concrete barriers on either side of the entrance, and the entrance itself is only slightly wider than the semi, meaning that the ONLY way to get a truck in there is straight in. Not possible on a narrow roadway.
I thought about doing it - figured if I got stuck, they have a backhoe that would easily pull the truck out, but they said no big deal. I didn't care, either, nothing else to do when I got back, so I thought anyway, take your time. Hour and a half later and it was done.
Anyway, after work was over, picked up my son, deposited the check my dad sent me, got home, I was bound and determined to do the hike up in the mountains. I had no desire to, so I took a half hour nap, got up, corralled the dogs, leashed them and away we went. Cranked for 45 minutes - a very good walk. The only thing strange was running into a group of guys up there smoking dope. I bypassed that quickly and held my breath. They actually asked me if I wanted to smoke some weed with them - I politely declined. A few simple reasons: it's illegal; I don't do that anymore and left that life behind a LONG time ago; and I am a CDL truck driver that is exposed to random drug testing. That stuff stays in your system for up to 30 days. I haven't been drug tested for almost a year now - it's coming, trust me, I will show up to work and the boss will hand me a pile of papers and say "You've been chosen". It's a random computer pick as required by federal law.
I really do NOT like marijuana. If you've never smoked it - then trust the ads that show the people sitting like vegetables on the couch. You smoke it, get extremely high, and then mostly you just sit there and - be high. Maybe not everyone does that, but many do. It's VERY bad for your lungs. I was coughing 24 hours a day at the end of my marijuana use in my teens and then finally quit when I was 20. I would literally be coughing in my sleep. I would wake up coughing and would STILL smoke that stuff. 3 months after quitting, the coughing stopped and I never looked back.
Anyway, it was just an odd experience to find a group of men and boys up there smoking way, getting higher than a kite. One of them couldn't get over the Danes - he was yelling about the size of "those dogs" LONG after I was by them.
Got back and the new tenant who is leaving on the 16th - decided to buy steak for everyone with the caveat that I grill them. OH YEAHHHHHHH. Ribeye steak from Costco. Costco has some pretty good meat. These steaks were THICK and delicious. I hated to ruin good steaks by cooking them til' medium well, but that's what everyone wanted. My steak was still alive, kicking and bleeding.
The only problem? My grill was out of propane! My old place for getting the bottle refilled was not only out of business, they had torn the place down and built an "El Pollo Loco" restaurant there! BTW, that's Spanish for The Crazy Chicken. Lol.
I found another place, but dang that took a lot of time. Here it is 8:00 pm and I am JUST winding down after starting at 5:00am. I'll tell you what, though, it was all worth it: that steak was SO fine. I ate far too much food today and tomorrow morning? I'm going to extend my walk by half again at least what I normally do.
On, and it's cooled down considerably - yayyyyyy! It's MUCH too early for summer to start, when it started getting into the 90's - at the beginning of March - I was appalled, perplexed and stupified. I just couldn't believe that we were already going to start SUMMER. Thank goodness and God that it's in the mid 60's right now, the house is cool and I DON'T have to run the AC.
Anyway, I'm done with this one, I hope you all are doing well and surviving the storms. There's a LOT of bad news out there - I'm at the point where I don't really want to focus or even hear much about it. It is what it is and there isn't a thing I can do about it - cept' pray and seek the Lord.
G'nite.
ben
Nice to be busy again.
This morning's run was in the semi and was WAY out east. Highway 79 into Florence, well the outskirts of Florence, and then get on this unmaintained road called Price road.
The road was horrible. I had to drive at least 10 miles on this dirt, crappy road full of rocks, shaking the truck the entire way, even though I was only going like 10MPH. It was nice out there, though, all farmland in a small, hidden valley. It's funny to see stuff like that you never knew existed. The contractor was installing irrigation pipe. I got to go pet some horses and take in the fresh air and pleasant views - it took them quite a long time to get the truck unloaded - a LONG time.
There was only one way that I could have gotten the semi into that place - back down a steep embankment into a farm field. The entrance to the place I was delivering to has concrete barriers on either side of the entrance, and the entrance itself is only slightly wider than the semi, meaning that the ONLY way to get a truck in there is straight in. Not possible on a narrow roadway.
I thought about doing it - figured if I got stuck, they have a backhoe that would easily pull the truck out, but they said no big deal. I didn't care, either, nothing else to do when I got back, so I thought anyway, take your time. Hour and a half later and it was done.
Anyway, after work was over, picked up my son, deposited the check my dad sent me, got home, I was bound and determined to do the hike up in the mountains. I had no desire to, so I took a half hour nap, got up, corralled the dogs, leashed them and away we went. Cranked for 45 minutes - a very good walk. The only thing strange was running into a group of guys up there smoking dope. I bypassed that quickly and held my breath. They actually asked me if I wanted to smoke some weed with them - I politely declined. A few simple reasons: it's illegal; I don't do that anymore and left that life behind a LONG time ago; and I am a CDL truck driver that is exposed to random drug testing. That stuff stays in your system for up to 30 days. I haven't been drug tested for almost a year now - it's coming, trust me, I will show up to work and the boss will hand me a pile of papers and say "You've been chosen". It's a random computer pick as required by federal law.
I really do NOT like marijuana. If you've never smoked it - then trust the ads that show the people sitting like vegetables on the couch. You smoke it, get extremely high, and then mostly you just sit there and - be high. Maybe not everyone does that, but many do. It's VERY bad for your lungs. I was coughing 24 hours a day at the end of my marijuana use in my teens and then finally quit when I was 20. I would literally be coughing in my sleep. I would wake up coughing and would STILL smoke that stuff. 3 months after quitting, the coughing stopped and I never looked back.
Anyway, it was just an odd experience to find a group of men and boys up there smoking way, getting higher than a kite. One of them couldn't get over the Danes - he was yelling about the size of "those dogs" LONG after I was by them.
Got back and the new tenant who is leaving on the 16th - decided to buy steak for everyone with the caveat that I grill them. OH YEAHHHHHHH. Ribeye steak from Costco. Costco has some pretty good meat. These steaks were THICK and delicious. I hated to ruin good steaks by cooking them til' medium well, but that's what everyone wanted. My steak was still alive, kicking and bleeding.
The only problem? My grill was out of propane! My old place for getting the bottle refilled was not only out of business, they had torn the place down and built an "El Pollo Loco" restaurant there! BTW, that's Spanish for The Crazy Chicken. Lol.
I found another place, but dang that took a lot of time. Here it is 8:00 pm and I am JUST winding down after starting at 5:00am. I'll tell you what, though, it was all worth it: that steak was SO fine. I ate far too much food today and tomorrow morning? I'm going to extend my walk by half again at least what I normally do.
On, and it's cooled down considerably - yayyyyyy! It's MUCH too early for summer to start, when it started getting into the 90's - at the beginning of March - I was appalled, perplexed and stupified. I just couldn't believe that we were already going to start SUMMER. Thank goodness and God that it's in the mid 60's right now, the house is cool and I DON'T have to run the AC.
Anyway, I'm done with this one, I hope you all are doing well and surviving the storms. There's a LOT of bad news out there - I'm at the point where I don't really want to focus or even hear much about it. It is what it is and there isn't a thing I can do about it - cept' pray and seek the Lord.
G'nite.
ben
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Thursday
Week's just flying by - working all day every day is just plain wonderful. Seriously, it is. I got to work this morning, left and was driving, delivering, moving all day long until I got back just in time to leave. Work owes me yet another half hour break. 30 minutes automatically deducted from my time every day when I log out - whether I take the break or not.
My last delivery? It's a retirement resort that's been around for something like 30 years. It's a square mile of houses that have limited access through 24 hour security guards. It contains two 18-hole private golf courses. I got in there - the lane to go by the security house was JUST wide enough to fit the truck without wiping out the building, taking down the gate and taking out the stop arm.
Anyway, I followed the instructions - ended up having to back out of that mess - almost 400 feet worth with retirees riding bicycles and golf carts and paying absolutely no attention to the fact that this large truck is backing up and could run clean over the top of them if they weren't careful.
But - you learn to expect people doing mindless and or stupid things. I went about 1 mile an hour, I think, in order to be on the safe side.
My dad sent me a $100.00 check today out of the blue. That was nice - a hundred bucks is a hundred bucks, I'll take it. Figure to buy 3 rolls of sod, put it in the back yard and see how it does. That won' cost more than $15. The rest will either go to pay the upcoming satellite bill or dump it onto the eletric card reader.
Writing another ad for Craigslist - another temp roommate. This one is leaving soon - has the electricity turned on in her new house and the home inspection I think is done. She said the inspector told her it has a brand new roof and the water heater is only a year old. That's good info - especially about the roof. I plain need the extra money to get things done around here. I want to get that rock in, I want to get those windows fixed and other things. The awning? Out of the question. Just plain too expensive. I will take out another 401k loan in July if there's any money left in that account. It's dropping every day. Hundreds of dollars a day just disappear out of my 401k account. I switched to a guaranteed fund - which probably isn't REALLY guaranteed, but it's the lowest risk available. I didn't have a lot in there - almost 7k - it's down to $4,600 since this s*** began in - last year sometime I guess. It almost seems to me it would be better to just cash the thing out and pay the huge fines to the government than to lose the entire amount to - this chaos we call an economy right now.
Really - I check that account almost every day, and just about every day, I see it shrink by a hundred, two hundred, whatever. I'm not putting ANY money into my 401k account right now. Well, take that back, my loan repayments go into that fund, I wish it would just go into a savings account. It's a total waste. Instead, I'm putting it into my online savings account. Anyway, I owe a little over $200 on the second loan. It's paid off in July - or I could pay it off early and get another loan. But I don't think I can take out that much, maybe $1,500 max. I'm not fully vested yet and the amount I can borrow isn't as much as I would like. PERHAPS I could get a good used awning for that much money, dunno.
What I do know is the new tenant came up with a GREAT idea: Get some of those camping/recreation canopies/gazebos and set those up in front of the western side of the house. Same effect: keep the sun off the house. Hmm, maybe that's what I should spend my dad's money on. Money spent will save a LOT in electricity.
Anyway, I don't want to go on forever - though I know I'm forgetting something here. LOTS of sick people all over the place. I'm trying my best to wash my hands often and just not touch my face in an attempt to NOT get sick. I have no scratches or cuts on my hands right now - a good thing. I was at a construction site today - a worker was sneezing and coughing all over the place, directly at people, didn't put his hand in front of his mouth, didn't care I guess. I kept FAR distance from that freak.
That's it - for now - if that "thing" pops back into my head, I'm back on here writing it up.
C'ya later.
ben
My last delivery? It's a retirement resort that's been around for something like 30 years. It's a square mile of houses that have limited access through 24 hour security guards. It contains two 18-hole private golf courses. I got in there - the lane to go by the security house was JUST wide enough to fit the truck without wiping out the building, taking down the gate and taking out the stop arm.
Anyway, I followed the instructions - ended up having to back out of that mess - almost 400 feet worth with retirees riding bicycles and golf carts and paying absolutely no attention to the fact that this large truck is backing up and could run clean over the top of them if they weren't careful.
But - you learn to expect people doing mindless and or stupid things. I went about 1 mile an hour, I think, in order to be on the safe side.
My dad sent me a $100.00 check today out of the blue. That was nice - a hundred bucks is a hundred bucks, I'll take it. Figure to buy 3 rolls of sod, put it in the back yard and see how it does. That won' cost more than $15. The rest will either go to pay the upcoming satellite bill or dump it onto the eletric card reader.
Writing another ad for Craigslist - another temp roommate. This one is leaving soon - has the electricity turned on in her new house and the home inspection I think is done. She said the inspector told her it has a brand new roof and the water heater is only a year old. That's good info - especially about the roof. I plain need the extra money to get things done around here. I want to get that rock in, I want to get those windows fixed and other things. The awning? Out of the question. Just plain too expensive. I will take out another 401k loan in July if there's any money left in that account. It's dropping every day. Hundreds of dollars a day just disappear out of my 401k account. I switched to a guaranteed fund - which probably isn't REALLY guaranteed, but it's the lowest risk available. I didn't have a lot in there - almost 7k - it's down to $4,600 since this s*** began in - last year sometime I guess. It almost seems to me it would be better to just cash the thing out and pay the huge fines to the government than to lose the entire amount to - this chaos we call an economy right now.
Really - I check that account almost every day, and just about every day, I see it shrink by a hundred, two hundred, whatever. I'm not putting ANY money into my 401k account right now. Well, take that back, my loan repayments go into that fund, I wish it would just go into a savings account. It's a total waste. Instead, I'm putting it into my online savings account. Anyway, I owe a little over $200 on the second loan. It's paid off in July - or I could pay it off early and get another loan. But I don't think I can take out that much, maybe $1,500 max. I'm not fully vested yet and the amount I can borrow isn't as much as I would like. PERHAPS I could get a good used awning for that much money, dunno.
What I do know is the new tenant came up with a GREAT idea: Get some of those camping/recreation canopies/gazebos and set those up in front of the western side of the house. Same effect: keep the sun off the house. Hmm, maybe that's what I should spend my dad's money on. Money spent will save a LOT in electricity.
Anyway, I don't want to go on forever - though I know I'm forgetting something here. LOTS of sick people all over the place. I'm trying my best to wash my hands often and just not touch my face in an attempt to NOT get sick. I have no scratches or cuts on my hands right now - a good thing. I was at a construction site today - a worker was sneezing and coughing all over the place, directly at people, didn't put his hand in front of his mouth, didn't care I guess. I kept FAR distance from that freak.
That's it - for now - if that "thing" pops back into my head, I'm back on here writing it up.
C'ya later.
ben
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