What's everybody doing today?

[Weedygarden]

Got a call from K this morning. His company is having layoffs. Several of the superintendents were let go but K was offered the option to go back to his previous job and pay(hourly). I think it is because he didn't leave the union when he was promoted but kept his union benefits rather than pay out of pocket for it all. The superintendent who was promoted at the same time and sucks at his job to the point the company was putting his work on K's plate got to keep his job and salary. So now I have to rework our budget and figure out how we are going to continue saving for our homestead at the current rate. It looks like we may have to save less as K will get less and rent for a tad longer then we wanted. We have 2 years left on our lease and we can cover everything but it will be a tad tight.

Still waiting for K to call again with all the updated info such as what happens with his paid vacation days he earned and his paid sick days. I also want to know when the payday switch happens.

Glad we got the second freezer and have it mostly filled!

Scary times! I know someone who had the same job for 15 years and was laid off earlier this year. It is good that you have been preparing and stocking up.

 

[LadyLocust]

Scary times! I know someone who had the same job for 15 years and was laid off earlier this year. It is good that you have been preparing and stocking up.

Many, many places around here need help (hiring) but no workers. Situation could be changing of course.

 

[phideaux]

Fun day so far, theythey went walking, filled my woodbox, watched "Second Hand Lion", made cookies, now they want to put up our Christmas tree . (which we were not).
Then watch another movie and eat again. Don't know when they will be ready for bed.

Fun day.



Jim

 

[Weedygarden]

Many, many places around here need help (hiring) but no workers. Situation could be changing of course.

I've seen that as well. When Amish was in town, there were all kinds of things such as food delivery where there was no one to do the job. On the other hand, there were probably many people collecting government money.

 

[Aerindel]

One thing to keep in mind, jobs, particularly in rural places COST money. If its some very low paying little job, you can have lots of people who need a job, but who can't afford to have a job that low paying. You can get along for a long time with almost no money, as long as you don't have a job and aren't spending money on food, clothes, gas, childcare, etc and all the other stuff you can save huge amounts of money on by doing yourself, as long as you don't have a day job.

 

[Grimm]

Scary times! I know someone who had the same job for 15 years and was laid off earlier this year. It is good that you have been preparing and stocking up.

I have plenty socked away outside of our normal savings to cover rent and expenses for a while if needed. After the period when K was out of work when I was pregnant with Roo I have tried to put money aside to help cover expenses for times like these.

 

[Weedygarden]

I have plenty socked away outside of our normal savings to cover rent and expenses for a while if needed. After the period when K was out of work when I was pregnant with Roo I have tried to put money aside to help cover expenses for times like these.

I save money for uncertain times as well. Without a mortgage payment, car payment, or other bills, it is easy to live within my means.

 

[Amish Heart]

Many people around our rural area have a number of jobs.

 

[Grimm]

I save money for uncertain times as well. Without a mortgage payment, car payment, or other bills, it is easy to live within my means.

My folks set their trust up to cover the expenses for their house and taxes so if we need it we can live there on pennies (food and utilities) until we die.

 

[Amish Heart]

Dinner's cooking. Grandson split more wood. Granddaughter took three Ranger loads of manure out of the open barn to the mound of manure area. Little granddaughter is talking to her crazy mom on the phone. I'll be dropping the twins off for Bible study at the Menno church after supper. They are ready to go visit with people after having school at home all day. Little granddaughter was happy to go, though.

 

[Peanut]

He is not paying any. The contract was, he takes care of the property including hay field and cuts and square bales half the hay. All we want that property for really is the hay field. And I just don't want to deal with him anymore. I am so annoyed right now

Locally we had a horrible year for hay. We had more rain than any year in the last 15, which was the problem. The boys baled 400 round bales this year. All of it is crappy hay. We had so much rain, hay would never get dry before getting rained on again.

They had one field that got rained on 3 times before is was finally dry enough to bale. They were burning gallons of fuel running hay fluffers over the fields again and again, beating the crap out of the hay every time... which means the hay was losing nutrition every time.

All that rain also meant an explosion of weeds in hay fields. I noticed this all summer, looking at fields on the way to town etc. As of 30nov we've had 12 inches more than our yearly average, still another month to go. I'd talk to a few other farmers in the area before judging that guy to harshly...

Little projects for me all day, nothing major...

 

[Aerindel]

Many people around our rural area have a number of jobs.

Yeah, pretty much required here. If you have one job, you need a few more so you can actually make a profit.

 

[Amish Heart]

And some jobs are seasonal. Some have full time jobs, but do extra stuff that brings in income when they see the opportunity.

 

[Weedygarden]

And some jobs are seasonal. Some have full time jobs, but do extra stuff that brings in income when they see the opportunity.

I always did that. I taught full time, and tutored, taught GED classes, house sat and more. I still do that. If someone asks if I can house or dog sit, I do.

 

[phideaux]

Kids have had their decorated cookies, home popped popcorn, now they watching "Michael " classic movie.

Jim

 

[Bacpacker]

Took a vacation day today. Had a Dr appointment this morning, stopped by the vet to pick up some meds for our dog. Then came back to house picked up wife and we took a ride to Cades Cove in the Smokies. Top of the mountain got 11" of snow Monday/Tuesday. The cove had 3-4". It was beautiful today, temp around 40 and very small crowd compared to summer. We had a great time. Other than working and Thanksgiving day, we haven't got out and done much of anything. It was a nice diversion.

 

[ClemKadiddlehopper]

My dog had puppies 4 days ago. Out of 11 puppies, 6 have survived. She is drying up. She keeps dumping two of them out so now I am a kangaroo dog mom. I keep those two in a pouch under my shirt. Every few hours I literally spoon feed them. I had to go to town and got some funny looks because of the noises my stomach was making. Puppies can be quite squeaky.

 

[LadyLocust]

My dog had puppies 4 days ago. Out of 11 puppies, 6 have survived. She is drying up. She keeps dumping two of them out so now I am a kangaroo dog mom. I keep those two in a pouch under my shirt. Every few hours I literally spoon feed them. I had to go to town and got some funny looks because of the noises my stomach was making. Puppies can be quite squeaky.

They do make baby cat/dog bottles.

 

[ClemKadiddlehopper]

Not available here and I don't know when one will actually be delivered. Town is 1.5 hours away and it only has one horse. The puppies have learned to suck milk off of a largish baby spoon so its not a huge issue. Its the constant feeding morning, noon and night that is.

 

[zannej]

Hashbrown, kitchen looks gorgeous!
I'm exhausted. Friend had to go to the ER to get his MRI done. Took over 6 hours before they did it & then had to wait another hour & a half. I had an allergic reaction to something in the air in the ER so I went to Lowes for a bit to get something on clearance (2"x2"x4' angle stock for around $6 when it's normally $29). Sat in the truck waiting for a few hours. Had to order takeout food and drive to pick it up bc my friend wasn't out before the place closed. He finally got out & I took him home. He's only 30 but he had a stroke. Has a blood clot in his head that is stopping his left eye from working. He needs to see a neurologist to see what they can do about it.
Brain is too fried to think of much else.
Oh, almost forget, we got a package put on the porch while I was gone. Mom saw it delivered. Someone (I suspect the neighbors) came over and opened the box, dumped the contents looking for something they might want, and then left. Mom said the dogs started barking & growling so they might have scared the person off. Nothing stolen as far as we can tell, but it pisses me off. Gonna have to get some cameras set up out there & some sort of motion sensor to scare people.

 

[UrbanHunter]

Took the wife to the foot doctor yesterday, he removed a little around one of her bad toe's, but overall said that her feet looked good, come back in 6 weeks....

Transplanted some baby plants into slightly larger containers, fun to watch them grow. The raised beds are doing very well and I am planning to move a couple spinach plants into the hydroponics as they will grow much faster and I can harvest them while the ones outside are growing slowly to provide new starter plants a few weeks out. I noticed one of the beet plants outside, now that the night time temperatures have dropped it seems to just be taking off, lots of new growth and nice big base, I have them scattered throughout the raised beds planted in 3 week intervals so will need to start harvesting soon. Between indoors and out I now have about 25 different things growing. Not bad for December. The wife is really enjoying having the fresh Herbs available.

 

[MoBookworm1957]

I'm resting today as much as possible.
Grand daughter Estelle and I will be making new memories tomorrow.
We will be making cookies together.
She is such a good helper some of the time.
Other times she's a butt.
But in all fairness, she's 3 years old too.
We will eat leftover popcorn balls from Halloween, watch both versions of "How the Grinch Stole Christmas".
Take Strawberry outside several times.
Her and Strawberry will fuss at each other.
If Granny gets lucky, maybe Estelle and Strawberry will take a nap at some point.
We will have sew on her new sewing machine too.
Eat "noodles" with mushrooms, bits of leftover meat of some kind.
Memories are being made tomorrow.

Correction to the date:
I have the little big girl Saturday.
Instead of today.
Found that out at 0930 hours this morning.

 

[snappy1]

Did a return for freezer that was never received. Ordered another to pick up tomorrow (wish that had been available the first time.) Says it's in stock so we will see.

Still haven't heard from the fella in jail and we called the jail. He is supposed to get bond today. This needs to be over soon!

Not much sleep last night again.

Today, I hope to pick up some leaves and throw them in the rose garden. And pitch my pumpkin that was a decoration on the porch. The wild animals will be happy!

Might decorate porch for Christmas.

 

[MoBookworm1957]

Not doing much today.
Got a migraine trying to start.
Either that or weather's going to change again.
Or both.
Don't even want coffee.
Strawberry got walked.
She's sleep in her chair.

 

[Patchouli]

@ClemKadiddlehopper if you have anything like a tincture with the eyedropper you could get that cleaned up and use for the puppies' feeder. Hope everything works out.
My day will be same as yesterday. Hope to get an order of herbal meds placed. Maybe look at seeds online.
@UrbanHunter you've gotten a lot done with your gardening. Very impressive.
@snappy1 you've had some bad days lately. Personally, I wish you'd take a vacation day.
@Weedygarden you remind me of my aunt. She always worked hard, always had something going on.
I'm getting a headache too, mobookworm.
Smoky mountains with snow sounds lovely.

 

[phideaux]

What a good, fun time spent with grands ...

Jim

 

[Weedygarden]

My sinuses have been draining for months. Sigh

The PA recommended Flonase to me. I had never used any nasal sprays before, but what a difference it made! I don't know if doctors are recommending it for the virus, but I have heard that people are using it and it is supposed to help with the loss of taste and smell. I still keep Flonase in my purse and use it on the days I have a runny nose.

 

[Grimm]

Was woken up at sunrise by the overnight delivery guy. I had to sign for it and they insisted on knocking even though we have a doorbell that works. When I am under 3 blankets upstairs in bed with the door closed I can't hear any knocking. The dogs woke me up barking at the door.

It was K's checks. 3 in total. One was his check we would normally get tomorrow. Second was for the 3 days he worked as salary this week and the last was the check to cover his paid vacation days he earned. More than I expected. I will be depositing the paycheck only right now. I figure if we need the others after we get a normal 40 hr a week check (2 weeks for the first full check) then I will be able to cover things til we adjust. I might be able to make things work where we don't have to adjust our savings.

K and I had a long talk yesterday about how this is a good thing for us. When he was salary he worked ridiculous hours for no extra pay. We hardly saw him and the girls hated when he worked weekends (I did too for the lack of pay). Now he will work a normal 40 hr week with overtime here and there with the bonus of the overtime pay. They sent him to a different jobsite and it happens to be the one 30 minutes from our home! He can get more sleep now and spend more time with us rather than driving to Los Angeles to work on the new football stadium. He called me nuts for continuing to budget for gas for his commutes to L.A. once he got the company truck and gas card. Now he is grateful. Without the truck and gas card I don't have to wonder where the money is going to come from in our budget. I wanted to be prepared in case they took the truck away for some reason. I got to do the I told you so dance last night but K wasn't offended. Again he was grateful I had forethought on the issue.

Another good point is now K will be paying into the union vacation fund again! He will get a check every 6 months (July and December roughly) to cover time off work for a vacation. Those were nice to get before he went salary. But the paid time off was nice too.

Since K stayed in the union we don't have to worry about our health insurance. It stays the same. That was one good reason to stay union. Plus he doesn't lose his retirement with the union either. The company wanted him to go 'confidential' but my dad and I talked him out of it. K saw the prospect of being a limited partner in the company (if the other partners vote you in) while my dad and I saw the loss of retirement and benefits if he should get laid off. Glad he listened to me for once.

I did tell K he should think about going to a different company as this one may offer him this position again but they may not let him stay union. I reminded him he has skills that even in a good economy here are very hard to find. He could take those skills to a different company and get a huge pay jump and still not be a superintendent with all the stress. One of his previous apprentices went to a different company a year back and makes more than K did salary.

But enough of my ranting.

 

[snappy1]

The PA recommended Flonase to me. I had never used any nasal sprays before, but what a difference it made! I don't know if doctors are recommending it for the virus, but I have heard that people are using it and it is supposed to help with the loss of taste and smell. I still keep Flonase in my purse and use it on the days I have a runny nose.

Thanks! I've never tried that.

 

[GrannyG]

Feed prices are getting high...had to get critter feed today....
Hen scratch....$9.50
Lay pellets...$15.00
Red Barn (sweet Feed)..$9.75
Alfalfa...square bale...$16 each

My critters need to go on a diet....