Tag Archives: money

Instructions on how to spend a very depressing day.

 

Step 1.   Hire an appliance repairman to diagnose why your ice maker died and the fridge isn’t cooling properly.

Step 2.   Pay said repairman $95 to walk through the door.

 

 

Step 3.  Cry a little when repairman tells you your  expensive AF   six year old refrigerator will be requiring burial rites in the very near future.

 

 

6 years old!

Too young to die… or so I thought.

According to the repairman, 6-8 years is now the average lifespan of new appliances.

 

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This makes me regret getting rid of the 1970’s almond Montgomery Ward fridge that came with our house when we moved in.

Ugly? Yes.

Fancy features? No.

But the damn thing still worked….. and now I miss it.

6 years.

 

 

For the love of God… she’s still shiny!

 

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She still looks new!

But apparently she’s rotten at the core.

 

 

Step 4.  Grab a girlfriend for consolation and proceed to the appliance stores to search for a suitable replacement.

Have you been to the appliance stores lately?

Even the clearance prices will make you faint.

 

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Mind you, that particular one had been returned, refurbished and was riddled with dents.

There’s lots to choose from, if you want to pay.

And pay. And pay…

 

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There are fancy French Door models.

Models with ridiculous features…

 

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And for the prices they’re charging?

I hope that one cooks, serves and cleans up the kitchen after marinating my meat.

 

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Herb storage?

 

 

One model even had a built in one of these –

 

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Yes.

An infuser pitcher, fitted right into the door. I paid $3.99 for mine… what do you want to bet this baby adds an extra $200 to the purchase price?

Step 5.  Go from store to store, avoiding salesmen and their high pressure “Oh, that sale ends today, better buy now!”  B.S….. never quite finding that perfect fridge that will fit in your crazy kitchen. ( We had to remove half a wall to fit my current one in. )

Step 6.  Have long booze filled lunch with girlfriend and curse refrigerator manufacturers.

 

 

Step 7.  Return home to melting ice and lukewarm milk.

Step 8.  Repeat steps 4 through 7 until replacement is found.

 

 

 

 

 

In case you didn’t know….

 

Don’t worry..

I do.

 

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Did you know…. after the battle of Waterloo in 1815, dentures were made from the teeth of dead soldiers? They were given to wealthy people who experienced tooth decay due to consuming too much sugar.

I’m not sure how bad my teeth would have to be before I wore a dead man’s… but I’m guessing pretty bad.

 

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Did you know….. mosquitoes are attracted to people who have recently eaten bananas?

This explains why I’m swarmed every time I start my morning with a smoothie.

 

 

Did you know…. castoreum, the vanilla flavored food additive used in baked goods can be listed as “natural flavoring” because it comes from the anal glands of beavers?

Thankfully it’s hard to procure and prohibitively expensive, so I doubt we’ll be finding it in our Twinkies anytime soon.

I’m sure the beavers aren’t thrilled either…

 

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Did you know…. preparing an Egyptian mummy took upwards of 70 days, and dead noblewomen were allowed to ripen for few days prior to the procedure so the embalmers wouldn’t find them too attractive.

Makes you wonder just how desperate for a date those fellows were….

 

 

Did you know.… Kemosabe means “soggy shrub”  in the Navajo language?

Good ole Tonto, not quite the faithful sidekick you thought he was.

 

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Did you know….  woodpecker scalps, porpoise teeth and giraffe tails have all been used as currency at one time or another?

This is good news for me as I am currently awash in woodchuck poo and am hoping it will be the next monetary trend.

Momma gonna make it rain up in here!

 

 

 

 

Apparently, he likes me.

 

Sometimes WordPress makes me laugh because I follow a lot of funny people.

 

 

Sometimes it makes me laugh because a lot of funny people follow me.

 

 

And sometimes it makes me laugh for totally unexpected reasons.

Like the other day when I clicked my notifications and saw this:

 

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Clearly I must make TANBHIR laugh because he liked the hell out of every comment I made on one of my old posts.

Every single comment.

That’s a lot of laughing.

 

 

Not enough for him to actually comment back or add anything to the thread, but clearly TANBHIR likes the like button.

Unfortunately since TANBHIR  (Who must be a serious fellow since his name is all CAPS) only wants to help me make money online so I did not return the favor and like him back. I also removed him from my followers list.

Sorry TANBHIR, but I’m not here to make money.

Better luck next time.

 

 

You just can’t win.

 

Debt…

 

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Almost everyone is in it…

And almost everyone dreams of winning the lottery to get out of it.

 

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(There’s no logical reason for this photo. I just Googled debt meme and came up with it.

A squirrel… in  full armor.

You’re welcome.)

 

So we worked hard, and became debt free.

 

 

We cut up all the credit cards, and paid them off. We paid off the cars, motorcycles and other assorted big boy toys.

Three months ago? We paid off our mortgage.

We’re now totally debt free.

Yay us!

 

 

Except no. Life doesn’t work that way.

For years we had nearly perfect credit scores.

(Perfect is 840, ours was 837.)

Until we started paying off debt, at which point they dropped like a stone.

Cut up and pay off your credit cards? Lose 34 points.

Which is wrong. So very, very wrong.

In every conceivable way.

The last time I checked?

 

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It went down 44 points because we no longer have a mortgage.

What the f*ckity  f*ck  f*ck?

Everything we own is paid for, we have more liquid cash than we’ve ever had before, our pension and retirement plans are set and we can live comfortably without fear.

For this we’re penalized?

 

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It is.

It really, really is.

 

 

 

 

Well, it must be nice.

 

Tax time is upon us, and like every other year…. we pay.

And pay.

And pay.

And pay.

 

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It’s bad enough the government swallows half our paycheck during the year..

But every April?

 

 

They want more. **

So I wait until April 14th to file.

I’m petty that way.

Tax laws have changed this year, and no… I’m not going to get political.

But the instructions on the payment voucher did make me laugh.

 

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No checks of $100 million or more accepted?

Damn.

Now I’m going to have to get cash.

As if.

At first I thought, well… it must be nice to be able to write a check like that.

 

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Yeah.

If you can write a check like that?

Chances are you won’t have to.

 

 

And that pretty much sums up our tax collection system.

 

**  If you don’t know who Laura Moon is?

Watch Neil Gaiman’s American Gods on Starz.

It’s mind bending, trippy and totally rocks!