Skipping Fall

Last week was cold. I work with a guy and he said we skipped fall. I know we had a lousy week here but a not so lousy week is in the near future, so I don't concur.
I like my co-worker. I spend more time with him now that I am out of the station, which is odd considering you don't think of couriers being in pairs or working together outside of the station, at least. We take separate vehicles to the same two locations. I stay at one while he heads over to the second. Before I head back to the station, I meet up with him and see if he needs help or such.
Weird week, it seemed. Being back, people seemed different. I'm off a couple days again, so I will be able to adjust more.
Rough going from a week at the beach and then back to the grind.
I was bored the first few days and hoped to be sent home early, but no such luck. Thursday and Friday, I had to stay later than usual. 36 hours is much more than my old 25 hour weeks that were only a month or so ago.
The first step to becoming independently wealthy to exploit every stream of income available. Not simply having a job and saving money, but exploiting free time to its max without losing effort elsewhere. Seeing that I have debt to abolish, I'm working on that front along with the long term 401k contributions and to help tax considerations. Paying taxes on money made makes money worth less, I rather use less money by choice than give it away to the government.

Alabama, more staining.

Fall break- we left on Saturday and drove until we hit Alabama around 7. We could have gone further, but the whole trip to the beach was meant to be not hateful. We got to our beach hotel around 3 on Sunday.

5 days and nights at the beach went well enough.

Drove home with only stops for gas, food and restroom reasons on Friday.

On Saturday, I was too meh to do much beyond mowing the lawn and filling the propane tank for some steaks on the grill. I did stain the lower deck on Sunday. 

Looks to be a couple weeks before I get to do more staining. The weather looks to be wet and cold.
Donated plasma today... the trip to the beach was rather expensive so all sources of income need to be tapped.

Too much rain for my liking

I have many blogs. I seem to repeat myself at times, if I'm not careful.
I've nothing new to say about the 2nd Amendment.
I used to blog more whimsically. It was a sort of diaryland thing, without focus or much purpose.
I have had a few more jobs than I care to have had. I have a blog focused upon that matter.
This blog is meant to be a weekly rehashing of my thoughts on the world. I interject a post from time to time, but I neglect weeks enough that such digression seems fine.
I have the unnatural ability to pursue things I've a weakness.
I lack the ability to organize my thoughts... yet I pursued being a librarian. I'm able to find stuff but being too neat, is too hard.
I was born with a problem it seems for I always had too much stuff in places that needed  to be less crowded. Mrs. Zieke(sp?) was kind enough to let me have 2 desks in 1st grade, or at least until we had a new student move to town.
I have trouble with driving, yet I am a professional driver.
Regardless, I started a blog posting about healthcare and health insurance that doesn't quite belong on this blog. Granted I do deal with healthcare and health insurance more than I like on a semi-daily basis.
Back in June, J had a blood test done to see if she had inherited a blood condition. Insurance denied the claim though the doctor was the one who suggested the testing. We lost the appeal, so $698 has to be paid... without going towards the deductible.
Back in June, we met the deductible for my youngest daughter when she had her heart scanned and such, yet we were still billed for her speech therapy sessions because they cap annual visit to 20 regardless of meeting the deductible, except when a need is documented. My youngest barely said words, so sessions  twice a week are in her best interest. I heard on Friday the sessions will be covered until December when our insurance is up. Many hours have bee spent talking with Humana... so I'll believe later...
I have Anthem and everything from my July 6th appt was covered or paid by the meager HRA money I have from my employer. My prescriptions are $5 each, but aren't covered by the HRA. By being off J's insurance, I'm saving over $1,700 a year
If everyone could work for FedEx, everyone would have health insurance.
I like FedEx. If I had to, I could walk to work. It's a mile or so from my home, which made the initial change in employment from the carwash that was 22 miles away seem worthwhile though the hourly wage difference of $.38. Carwash cut my hours and caused my carpal tunnel to be a daily concern, while I had guaranteed 17.5 hours a week and benefits beyond 401(K) at FedEx. Saving over $1000 a year on gas is a big hidden raise in itself, especial considering the time saved.
Anyways, having real cashflow with my current raises and work hours increased means I'm making double what I made at the carwash when I left.
I'm also less tired. Sure I'm grumpy on weekends of late from the rain and other diversions, but I'm physically able to do stuff around the house I've been putting off.

Yesterday, I got the top part of my deck stained before it rained. I'm sore today from using my carwash muscles. Still a lot left to stain... including undereneath and a second coat... stupid rain.
Might have gotten more finished but J quit on me and spent the rest of the day doing laundry since K and B were gone camping. K just did the day, while B was gone since Friday and came back this morning.
Only rotten thing about my promotion, aside from breaking in a van, is that I work at 3 of late and still get off work after 10. If I want to see my kids, I see them before they go to school. K leaves for the bus at 7:30, while B leaves around 8:30. D leaves around 12:25 and has Fridays off, so I see her most of all. We went a hayride with her classmates on Friday, but I had to work at 2:30 so we left sooner than intended. It was the 3rd different hayride I had been on through the pre-school. I went once with both the older kids. Strange they all went to a different farm. Thankfully, it didn't rain at all Friday.

threat of rain put damper on deck plans. Clogged sink blues.

I sanded the deck Tuesday. It was more hassle getting the sander and electrical cord out than actually sanding. I thought about staining today but the bathroom sink was slow draining and I decided to make the clog worse, it seems. Regardless, I fixed the clog after work, but now the drain leaks. I am not in the mood to fix the leak, and it's a minor leak that can be fixed in the morning.
Other than the dread of rain and not getting to finish staining, my mind has drifted to my concerns regarding gastroparesis. I wear green for my friend.
Stain dread and drain misdeeds seem petty when I think of how lucky I truly am to be able to eat, sleep, and do other normal things without trouble beyond my stupid carpal tunnel which is treatable with surgery...
Sure, I take medications that I'll take the rest of my life, but I'm in fair shape. I can donate plasma without trouble, at least.
I have no understanding of how bad gastroparesis is. I wish no one did.

Annoyed by lack of progress

I said rabbit, rabbit in hopes of good luck, but the month started flat. Weather was nice enough to start to stain Saturday, but we had morning plans and lunch before getting to it.
Spindles take forever and that's all we did by the time it got dark. Today we started at 10 with the elements attached to the spindles and we had to stop around noon to take B to a skate party. We then ate and got a new printer before I had to pick up B at 3. I then spent the next hour of so setting up the printer to print stuff for K's scout meeting at 5:30. By then, only an hour or so of daylight was left...
My mood was rotten. I was so amped to get the damn staining done that I'm bummed.
Hard part is essentially done, at least one coat applied, but time isn't a luxury I have if I work at 3 this week.
My carpal tunnel is not liking the staining.

Courier life

I got my pay raise on my last check, so I cleared an extra $100 on my weekly pay check. I don't have a regular route yet, but I did fill in this week for a guy who hurt himself. He always struck me as being useless since he tagged along with a guy who is rather good at what he does and basically the one guy does the work while the other just hauls it back to the station. Being the guy who hauled, I found myself very bored, but being paid better makes it not hateful. I usually start at 5:30 and don't lunch and get home after 10:30, but these two have to start at 3 and take a break so they aren't over 6 hours without a break when they get back and help with the sort. That said I put in an extra 8 hours this week than last, so my check should be $100 more than this past check.
The huge downer of the promotion is that my kids get home from school after 3, so I don't see them much. I hadn't seen J during week regularly for almost a year, so it isn't too strange, I guess.
If I stay on this particular route, I can still donate plasma without any conflict. I donate at 1, so I am done at 2. Though I work at 3, the first hour is literally driving to the location we have our pick up. After an hour, we can take our 30 minute break. Nothing at this location is heavy. It's just documents and movies. Lots of each, but still they weigh nothing compared to the normal warehouse work I had been doing, but now get to do after 8pm. Sure I feel meh after a boring hour long drive, but I'm physically rested and my plasma donation isn't an issue.
Easy money is what I want make. Plasma donation is easy, but long term, I don't think it's worthwhile.
I made $450 in the month of September. I had a coupon for $300 if I donated 5 times within 30 days, but the way the center rates work is $20 for 1st visit of a week and $50 for a second visit in the same week. My 5 visit was on a Monday, so I go another $50 the next time I went in. The place was having $30 bonus to those who donate 7 times in the month of September, so my next visit was $50, then the following 8th visit was the 2nd in the same week.
Everything is a fluke, so I'm not going next week to allow my body to recover completely.
Plasma donation is win-win. I may sound greedy, but I also know my plasma will be used to save lives. My father have ivig treatments, and they helped him greatly to maintain a level of functioning. I want to be charitable in win-win ways. I don't have financial resources to give, but I can find ways to be just as good. I have my older children in scouts, so I think pushing them to be good citizens is a sort of charity given what good works those organizations spur.
I want to end cancer and gastroparesis. What all I can do without throwing money I don't have towards them, I don't quite know, yet.

too hot to stain.

90 degrees is too hot to stain, so the weekend was a waste. Saturday, I fought off feelings of a migraine and slept earlier than usual.
Today, the big annoyance was the Epson printer having some sort of paper jam.