Blog

A 81-post collection

Finding the Raw Materials - My Adventures in Frugality for Freedom

This Saturday was the day I was supposed to change everything. Or start changing everything.

The ONLY farmer’s market I could find nearby operated one Saturday out of every month. Odd, I thought, but I thought I made it understood that we’d be going together to get infos.

The day dawned and Hubby volunteered to look after the kids whilst I ventured forth on my ownsome.

Like shit, I said, and bullied the kids and my main squeeze into coming along.

To an event that had shut ages ago from lack of interest. The webmeisters in question had evidently failed to notice. Yeesh.

Far be it for me to admit defeat. I went scavenger hunting for big, foam boxes that the BigBoxmarts tend to throw out.

Turns out they arrive Sunday. Fury.

Still, I managed to talk the nice folks into reserving me three of them and I plan on striking five seconds after the doors open.

Hubby, meanwhile, bought a shitton of perishable and frozen goods as an excuse not to be roped into further adventures.

I took mercy on him and went on a pricing expedition to Big Garden Chainstores B and M. I hit M first, because it was newer. Turns out Big Garden Chainstore M is interested in selling one all SORTS of semi-useful and decorative crap for both indoors and outdoors. The garden section is relatively tiny, but their big bags of rocks and sources of mesh are relatively cheap.

B had the bigger gardening section and was actually willing to sell one some varying items needed for hydroponics… but they had no hydroponics-for-idiots starter kits. Just separate items for a whole ton more. Big Garden Chainstore B loves selling items separately, they get more money that way.

Next, I tried the long shot, the biggest dollar shop in the area. It used to sell all sorts of Demtel crap at much less than the easy-installments-of-X tallied up to.

It had been a long time since I’d seen any dollar shop selling Demtel-associated gadgetry, and this visit was no exception.

Maybe Demtel (and its relatives, you know the sort “but wait! There’s more!”) realised they were loosing their hats by selling their shite directly and stayed on the late-night television-only advert circuit. I dunno.

Still, at the end of the day, I know where to strike, come the morrow.

If you can imagine a plump, frumpy commando ninja who cackles occasionally and talks to herself… that would be me. Whisking from A to B to C with a gleeful little scamper and a lot of lookers-on wondering who that strange, lumpy ‘tard was.

And as soon as hubby lurches into wakefulness, that day, I’ll have my mats ready. All I’ll need from him is some fresh garden biomass (You’d know it as “lawn clippings”) to feed to the compost-tumbler and turn into industry-free high-quality potting soil

I Can't Fix Everything.

I had a massive bout of depression, recently.

No, nothing epic. Just the kind that makes you feel like you’re backed into a corner and also that the gravity has been turned up by at least fifty percent.

I have been reading a lot of OWS and related topics. It’s sad for me that the greatest country in the world is threatening to implode because a few greedy arseholes find it more convenient to ship their investments to

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The Alien in the Playground

You can spot her from a mile away. The one kid playing alone. Lost in her own little world. She clearly wears a mixture of hand-me-downs and homemade clothing when all the other children are wearing clothes, relatively new, from the shops.

Some other children are approaching her. Even from this distant vantage point, you can tell their intent is not friendly. They are all bigger than her. Together, they could beat her into a pulp, but violence is not their pastime

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Harsh Truths we Should all Live With

These are truths I had to learn, myself. They’re not nice. Life is not nice. Neither are people you meet within it. Most of this is about them.

Though everyone is unique, you a not a special little snowflake. There are folks who think that just because they’re different, or think they have some kind of gift, then they’re entitled to special treatment. Not so. If you’re unique, then so’s everyone else.

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I can't brain, today.

I have the dumb.

It’s been bought on by a combination of late nights and bad sleep, both through circumstances I can’t control (I’m a Mum, remember?).

I shall be working on tomorrow’s entry in the rare moments when cognisance presents itself. Slowly, so I don’t hurt my wrist. And possibly fuelled by an endless stream of caramel mochachinos.

Then again, given how weirdly poetic I get on sleep dep, I could

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To cloud or not to cloud...

Any Apple fan worth their salt knows that Apple’s bringing the Cloud to the plebs, but what does it mean for writers like me?

Pros, cons and musings below the cut.

Pro: Convenience. A document or WIP [that’s Work In Progress for the unenlightened] can be accessed anywhere by any device, so long as you know the password.

Con: The potentiality for Fic Griefers. People who hack into your cloud just to mess with your work and cause

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