Peace and Quiet

Finally, a break in the madness. I have accomplished about 80% toward my goal of becoming a van dweller. I've downsized significantly and have most of my projects completed. Yesterday I found some bargains while shopping at local thrift stores. We went as far as Waynesville, Missouri, because Mavis had to pick up a free prescription there and we checked out several thrift stores, including Goodwill and Salvation Army. The unnamed thrift stores had the better bargains. I got a relatively modern TV for five dollars, plus about a hundred feet of cable and parts for another dollar. The VCR was ten dollars, and the hot pot for heating water in my room was fifty cents. Brand new! When we got back to Rolla I found a microwave oven on sale for two dollars and fifty cents, which I picked up for Brain, and he needed a small coffee maker which I found for a dollar. I picked up several floor lamps for two dollars each, complete with bulbs that worked. I found a skinny two shelf system to use as a side table beside my twenty dollar blow-up bed. There were other bargains to be found, including a new mop for a buck, a used bucket for a quarter, and a rake for fifty cents. I found new measuring cups, what appeared to be an unused citrus juicer, and a vegetable peeler which I got for another buck for all of them together. Plus a two sets of shelves and a hutch for organizing my desk, altogether for $10. I found nearly new comforters to pad my bed a bit, curtains, and a huge focal pillow that was perfect for lounging with a good book last night. The point of the exercise is that there is no reason to shop in a store without checking out thrift stores first. If I had needed to, I could have furnished an entire three bedroom house for about two hundred dollars. The items I picked up were merely the unused objects discarded by those with debt in the $20,000 range. It just doesn't make any sense, does it? Why go into debt to buy any of it? And most of what I got can be used in a van. Anything else can stay in my little room in a tiny trailer down by the river, where my cats will retire in peace and contentment.

In a few weeks I'll go back to Pennsylvania and get the rest of my stuff out of storage. When I get it all back here I have a small office in the trailer to finish the last of the downsizing and organizing. Half of the 5x5 storage room is filled with family memorabilia and holiday decorations. I plan to scan in all the children's art and writing, pictures, negatives, and etcetera, for creating DVD. That would include pictures of things I'd like to remember, then I can dispose of them. Anything with sentimental value will be dispersed to family. Another quarter of the storage room is filled with items to sell on Ebay. The remainder consists of kitchen items, clothes, personal items, excess toiletries, hiking gear, camping supplies, and other things to just sort through, purge a little, use, and sell as needed. I expect to have all of this completed by the end of September. It's a good thing, too! I'm going to be a grandmother again in March next year. I want to be able to drive up and plug in, to visit and help out.

Today I have several Ebay jewelry orders to fill and wrap, and plan to open a bank account here, at Bank of America. Commerce Bank isn't out this far. I might get the drivers license changed, too. That way when I get back from Pennsylvania I can move my unemployment case out here and start becoming a productive citizen again. I plan to take a minimum wage job and make the extra I'm allowed while on the dole, while I do a really comprehensive career assessment. Heh, heh, heh . . .

What I'd really like to do is play The Sims and vegetate, but that will be more fun later tonight when the TV is hooked up to cable and my beer is nicely chilled. I haven't celebrated in nearly two weeks, so it's time.