Put THAT in your pipe and smoke it, Discover Card!

This afternoon I put 4 envelopes in the mail. Each envelope contained a cashier's check in the total amount owed to each of 4 credit card companies. The combined amount was just over $2,000.

Yes, we are out of credit card debt and we've cut up our cards.

BUT, we're going to keep one card with a limit big enough to buy airline tickets, or a set of tires, or some other unforeseen expense, but small enough to pay off within three months.

Whew. Feels good! Now we have to buy Kevin a truck, which will require financing. I know, it's like slaying an orc only to turn around and face an uruk-hai (thanks to Burb for technical information), but at least when you make payments on a truck you can see and drive what you're paying for. I have no idea what I'm paying for when I make a credit card payment--gas? That fabric I bought last year? The thrill is gone.

This weary debtor is beginning to see the sun!

"I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore!"

PBS has a kid's show called "Arthur." Arthur's best friend is a rabbit named Buster. Buster now has his own show, "Postcards from Buster," wherein he travels around, learning about and from all kinds of different kids.

In one recent episode called "Sugartime" Buster learns how to make maple syrup. He learns from a couple of Vermont kids who have two mommies. PBS, under pressure from the new leader of the Department of Education, has decided to leave the decision to air it to local PBS stations, many of which are pulling the show. You can read the Boston Globe's account of it ">here.


Hello!
Is it true that you have pulled “Postcards from Buster” because it featured GLBT parents? As a believer in public TV and radio, I hope not.
Thank you, Lulu

(From them:)

Dear Lulu;
Thank you for taking the time to send us your thoughts regarding the Postcards From Buster, Sugartime episode. WOSU has decided to stay with the national PBS feed schedule at this time and not air the episode. We are in alignment with the rationale for this decision with PBS in that we feel that there are elements of this episode that parents should have the option of addressing with their young children at a time and manner of their own choosing. WOSU is dedicated to addressing controversial issues, such as those presented in the Sugartime episode in our primetime schedule, through documentary, drama, and public affairs programs that provide the right forum for thoughtful discussion and informed debate, however we are in agreement with PBS that there are unique sensitivities in the area of children's programming. Should you have any further questions, comments, or concerns, please feel free to contact me. Thank you and have a good day!

Sincerely,
Alysia Gobert-Smith
Audience Services Advocate
Local PBS Station


(My reply:)

Dear Ms. Gobert-Smith;

Thank you for your quick response.

I am disappointed with your decision. In light of the current political situation and administration, I cannot help but think that you are merely caving to the pressure brought to bear by a few anti-homosexual bigots. My husband and I are the parents of a 4-year old. We want him to know that there are many configurations of families out there, and that all loving homes are good homes. By not airing the episode, you are depriving parents of the opportunity to even see the episode, let alone of sharing the information presented and their views and beliefs about it.

And you’re obviously not thinking about the children being raised by GLBT parents. What will they think when they hear this news? PBS, once a leader in delivering positive messages of diversity to children, has dealt one more blow to their already beleaguered families by calling them “too controversial” for the “unique sensitivities” of children’s programming.

Your “rational” excuses are transparent. Your decision to not air the episode is censorship, plain and simple.

I can’t say that PBS has completely sold out, as some stations have decided to air it. But I can say that you, WOSU, have. Sell out to the conservatives—who have demonstrated their hostility to public television and radio time after time—and you’ll soon find yourself without a job.

Thank you for doing your part to make my home state that much more hostile and backwards. You will not be receiving any financial support from me.

Lulu
Address
Phone

The airwaves--ALL of them--belong to the public. If you don't like what you see, or what you don't see, they'd love to hear from you. "And have a good day!"

Like a Fine Wine

Yesterday when I pulled into my driveway, I put the car in Park and paused for a moment to look in the mirror. I smiled and noticed the "fine lines and wrinkles" that rushed into places formerly barred by the tight, dewy skin of my youth.

I flipped up the mirror. As I walked to the mailbox I felt very content with my new, older face, and with the entire process of aging. As it's the cusp of my 35th birthday, and because this issue comes up with the women I know and love, I felt that it was important enough to be blogged. (Inside joke for all you bloggers out there!)

My general feeling on aging is this: I like it! It's interesting, and I'm curious to see what happens next. Though I haven't quite made peace with dying, if I live out a normal life span I have a loooooong time to accept the idea. By the way, when I say "aging" I mean it more in terms of "progressing through the years," and not as "I'm old and getting older."

I've always chafed at the "never ask a lady her age" mindset, and I abhor it when women make a big deal about admitting their age whether they are 30 or 60 or 90. All this ridiculous deceit manages to do is imbed the idea that a woman can't and shouldn't be able to make peace with aging and, once she has passed some mythical age that embodies youth and beauty, currently about 19 in our culture, she creases and dries like an old, worthless piece of paper. And whoa to the woman who wasn't "pretty" to begin with! She's . . . she's . . . hardly worth talking about, huh?

Later that same evening, I worked out with the help of an exercise video. While rewinding and otherwise getting the video where I wanted it, I caught glimpses of a bunch of 18-year olds competing for the chance to get their no-hipped, big-boobed bodies splayed out in the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue. Afterwards, I sat down and flipped through a fashion magazine that I got for free at the local library. Amidst all of this "celebration" of youth, I came across a little essay by Nigella Lawson, celebrity chef. I say "celebration" because, well, was it? Those girls on the TV, who were lovely, were crying their eyes out when they didn't get picked to go to some island by a group of people who pick out their every "flaw" for an audience of millions, or for a chance to starve themselves to be a nameless (because most of them are) coat hanger for some overpriced and generally ridiculous designer clothes. Yes, the girls/women in fashion magazines are still really, really thin, despite all of our progress, and people make careers out of picking them apart and making them feel socially worthless if they have a zit. Celebration, indeed. More like mass hazing.

Anyway, Nigella's article was entitled "Celebrate Your Age!" wherein Nigella "reveals why she would never trade her 40s for her 20s." It's pretty good, and amazingly timely, and I like to think I resemble Nigella ever so slightly! Ha. I particularly liked this portion:

When you're young, the only judgments that seem to hold any weight are other people's. You worry what people are thinking about you, how they perceive you. Now I just don't have the time--and certainly not the inclination--for that kind of obsessive self-absorption. There's too much life going on to waste it worrying about dress size and approval.

It's refreshing to read, even though it was placed in the middle of a magazine that pays its words no heed. I would like to say that being self-assured doesn't mean that you give up the desire to look attractive, but it dampens the need to while changing the definition of attractive. I still want to look attractive and am working to get back into fighting shape. The difference is that I'm doing it to be healthier and to be more comfortable in my own skin. I've been relatively thin and athletic my entire adult life until this point, and I'm not about to let lingering bad habits rob me of my health or my ability to do what I love, like going running, or to unselfconsciously revel about, you know, with my husband.

But if I no longer turn heads, or feel confident in my ability to seduce any man that I might want to seduce (if I was single, ya'll), I really don't care! And do you know how good that feels? If I had to choose right now to live, mentally and physically, as I am, unhealthy pounds and all, or live as I was at a lithe, firm 25, I would choose now, hands down, no doubt. If in one decade I can reap a bumper crop of positive mental growth, what can I do in another decade, starting as I am at this better place?

The mental payoffs of maturing far exceed the loss of culturally-imposed, superficial "beauty" and "youth." Nothing is more attractive than enjoying yourself and your life. So Happy Birthday!

Lulu's Fifth

Hello! Do I have anything really interesting to say? Not really. However, I want to write something because I don't want my dear readers to get bored and give up on this story. So I'll let you in on some finance stuff.

In case you're wondering why we'll be here for at least another year, it's because we want to get out of debt while we still have reliable income. I'm going to give you numbers so you can see what we're up against here:

School loan (mine) = $19,000 That's the pay-off; I've spent the last seven years paying the interest. Kevin, who is now two classes shy of a degree, has no school loan because his parents paid for his schooling.

Land = $5,100 That's right--just $5,100 separates us from what is still, technically, owned by the bank and what's truly ours, in the capitalist sense of the word.

Credit cards = about $2,000. We've been paying these down rapidly. Two years ago, that figure stood at less than $500, but then I switched careers, and chose a commission-only career, and we racked up debt because I made no money. I also had to cash out one of my two 401K's to pay the mortgage--something that I know better than to do--and we were penalized for it. Bummer.

Personal loans = $16,000!! That was a shocker. We owe Kevin's parents more than half of that, because they loaned us money to help get the land and "consolidate" our credit card debts, and we haven't made any payments to them in nearly 3 years. They're charging us interest, too, though it's a fraction of what those lousy credit card companies charge. The rest goes to my dad, who had to help us with the mortgage during our beans and rice year (before I got my job here at Major McPublisher).

So that's just over $43,000 worth of debt. How does that happen? That seems outrageous when you look at what we don't have--we don't have car payments (and the only reason we have a fancy car is because my parents-in-law gave us a fancy car), we don't have furniture or big-time electronics (our tv is missing buttons and is losing its vertical hold), we don't have expensive clothes, we don't take lavish vacations (we've only taken 2 vacations in over 5 years--both to places where we could stay for free), we don't go out a lot.

I had to take out loans to go to school, and I worked every quarter except one. There is no way that I could've saved the money for college while working one of those just-above-minimum wage jobs so prevalent among twenty-somethings while trying to make rent. Believe me, I've always worked, and I've never lived lavishly.

Kevin and I don't keep a budget because there isn't that much extra money to spend. Once we pay the mortgage ($1,260 a month!), the bills, gas, daycare--there just isn't a lot left. We both treat ourselves to certain things--I spend too much on quilt fabric and Kevin eats out almost everyday and spends money on sodas from gas stations--and cutting back on those things will save some money but not enough to pay things off quickly enough. Still, those little luxuries are the first to go. I've already cut up my credit cards (goodbye online quilt stores!) and Kevin is chopping his up tonight if he hasn't already.

The good news is that we have some savings which we've decided to spend and a big payoff coming from our lucrative part-time decorating/building gig (which is ongoing, we hope and pray) and will be able to pay off the land and our credit cards, and put a small down payment on our house, within the next few months. That leaves us with $16,000 in personal loans, the $19,000 in school loans, and an inevitable truck payment because Kev's truck has seen better days--like the early nineties when it was built.

The school loan doesn't bother me so much since it's pretty much all principal now and I don't mind hauling it around. Which means that we have to pay off $16,000 and maybe $10,000-15,000 worth of good truck before we go anywhere. I will not reveal my salary, but that's in the neighborhood of what I make in a year so it will be interesting to see just how we're going to manage to pay it off.

Then, after that, we have to save enough to put in a pond with some sort of pump for garden water and firehoses, put in a well, and build a rudimentary but livable structure at Hot Waffles. So we're going to attempt to pay off/save about $50,000 in a year! Holy guacamole, it's worse than I thought! But I do love a challenge.

Tune in next time!

Quaternary: The Truth Comes Out

OK, here it is.

A little background: Kevin and I met and married in Moab, Utah. Land is very expensive there, and it is exceedingly difficult to grow anything but sage (heavenly aroma) and prickly things. We have both wanted a piece of land to homestead for years. I was pregnant. His parents had a converted carriage house on their property that we could live in for free. So we moved to Missouri and got crappy jobs that didn't pay very much because we didn't need very much.

We toyed with the idea of long-term carriage house living, or building a house on the in-laws' ample acreage, but decided the on-the-edge-of-town location and the proximity to parents just didn't cut it. We bought--with some help from a parental loan--18 acres in the country outside of a teeny rural community, about 40 miles from Columbia, MO and 100 miles from Kansas City.

Now this is a sweet piece of land. Imagine a piece of paper. Grab it on the long sides with your fingers and catch one of the short sides with your thumbs. Bend it so it forms a mellow U/bowl-shape with one short end higher than the other. That is how the land lays--high on three sides, sloping down to the fourth. Dam that fourth side, and you have a 1-2 acre lake. There are three nice size groves along with a small stand of large oaks that didn't want other oaks in their "bubble." The rest of the land is pasture grass. One of the long sides of the land--the one closest to the dirt road--slopes south, creating a perfect passive-solar home site and garden site. Our house is bordered by roads on the north and east sides, a neighbor's pasture land on the south, and a neighbor's woodland on the west. We can see one house, but it's way up on the southeast corner and, once we plant an orchard, we'll only see them in the winter. Still, there's no need for curtains. It's quiet. There are a lot of stars.

Our vision is simple: we want to build an off-the-grid home that is actually connected to the electric grid (if the cost isn't too high) so that we have the option of selling electricity to the power plant that we generate from the sun. We want to grow as much of our own, organic food as possible and sell the excess at farmer's markets or to restaurants/enlightened grocery stores. We want to spend as much time working at home as possible--hopefully all of it--and work for ourselves. We want to further the cause of local economies and build community. We want our kids to run around like Huck Finns--exploring, fishing, raising animals, tracking mud indoors--instead of sitting in front of the idiot box or rushing to the mall for $80 jeans. I want more time to quilt and read. Kevin wants more time to turn wood and write.

Ask yourselves, dear readers--what do YOU want from life? Are you doing what you really want to do? Do you lament spending 8-9 hours a day away from your kids/partner/online poker? Do you hate living in debt, even if it's "acceptable" debt such as a mortgage or student loan? Do you ever pull a Betty Friedan and look around and say "Is this all?" Do you realize that you will die one day and think Holy Shit! If I get to my deathbed after XX years doing this, I'm going to be pretty pissed at myself!

I do.

When I got laid off of my Missouri teaching job, Kev and I decided to make a change. We would move to Ohio, get good jobs (my big plan was to make a fortune selling pre-need funeral plans), buy a house and sell it for a profit, and use all the money we made to build our dream house at Hot Waffles.

"Hot Waffles" is the Stevie-coined name of our future farm. That's right. Hot Waffles.

To make a long story short, our Ohio plans aren't working out according to plan. My funeral sales job was a disaster that put us further in the hole. My job here is "nice" and pays pretty well, but read the deathbed paragraph and you will understand how I feel about its long-term potential. In short--and I'll get into details another time--our incomes have expanded but so has our spending. We're not saving anything (outside of my 401K), we're not going to make much of a profit, if any, off of our house, and we're not paying down our debt quickly enough. We figured on staying here another 3-5 years, but . . . why?

We've made a decision. We've fully examined all of our options. And we're heading back to Missouri, ASAP.

I have decided to share all of the sordid details--how much we owe, how much we need, the results of our research on just how in the hell we're going to pull this off, how much I'll miss my friends and family. Some of you might be curious about the details--I know I am. I know that I've often been frustrated by the rosy, detail-free articles about people who flee the city for a "simpler" life, but it always seems like they were investment bankers earning high six figures--someone who had made enough money to retire early, so la tee da--big deal! How hard is it to build an awesome house in the country and sit around on the porch all day when you have half a mil in the bank??

Kevin and I are not in that group. We shant be retiring early. We are making the decision to remove ourselves from a lifestyle that we can afford and consciously make less money in order to have more time to do what we've always wanted to do. And it's kinda scary! As I said to Kevin last night, if we do this, we have to commit to it. I don't want to get out there and work two crappy full-time jobs and get in the same trap that we are in here. It's a real change.

Don't despair my Japanese Friends (and mother)! We'll be here at least another year. It's scary to lay it all out here like this because it's a big life decision and . . . what if something changes? What if we fail? Then I'll look a big idiot and they're all gonna laugh at me!

Oooo . . . the drama. That's some good bloggin' material, right there.

#3 Goodbye Light Sage Sofa

I bought a sofa right before Christmas because I wanted one. Kevin and I don't have "real" furniture and our large living room looked rather empty/shabby with just our ripped vinyl sofa (free, compliments of my dad). I subscribe to magazines like "Traditional Home" and "Country Living" that are filled with pictures of beautiful rooms (filled with lovely sofas). Like my dear friend and loyal reader Raisinette, I love to decorate.

I just cancelled the order for my sofa. My sacrifice. That should give you some indication of how serious I am about the plans Kevin and I are making.

It's all happening so fast now, though it's been in the middle of our heads for years.

Not fast enough, though. We're looking at a year--at least.

More to come . . . .

Goodbye Part Deux

I know it's somewhat annoying to be so "mysterious," but what I have to say is important to me and I want to get it right. Getting things right take time (are you hearing this, corporate master?).

While working just now for that same corporate master, I came across this biased assertion in our world history textbook. The subject is imperialism:

"Nevertheless, colonial rule did bring some benefits to Southeast Asia. It led to the beginnings of a modern economic system."

Hmmm.

I am reading a book right now that is having the same impact on me at this stage in my life as The Dharma Bums had on me in my early twenties. The book is called The Contrary Farmer and is written by Gene Logsdon, a fellow Buckeye-stater who owns a 38-acre organic farm in the north-central region. He has written several how-to books about organic homesteading. I stumbled across it quite by accident at the local library. It's amazing how life sometimes throws you directions clearly labelled "Hey Dumbass--Go THIS way." This book is quickly becoming The Way. And I've only just finished chapter 2.

Chapter 2, by the way, deals with pastoral economics vs. industrial economics. Mr. Logsdon, ("Gene") is a fan of the former. In an eggshell, pastoral economics means not borrowing interest-laden money unless absolutely necessary, utilizing the barter system, keeping the economy as local as possible, and thus freeing yourself from the chains of the work, borrow, spend, pay interest model of the industrial economy that the Europeans so graciously brought to those primitive Southeast Asians. The industrial economy, on the other hand, is based on expanding the economy--growing, growing, growing, profit, profit, profit--without much thought of how much of both is really necessary. We've given it the right of way.

For the Southeast Asians, were "railroads, highways, and other structures" worth the end of their independence and a way of life that sustained them for thousands of years? Have you ever stopped to really think about how biased we are against "peasants" and other unmechanized farmers and their communities? How we seem to automatically assume that modernizing and mechanizing lead to a better quality of life, and then work all the time to stay ever more modern and ever more mechanized?

Further, we've divorced ourselves from nature so radically that we don't even think about doing things that not only work with nature, but also make sense in the industrial economy. I see all of these "mushroom houses" springing up all over the exurban area, yet the builders will put a wall of windows on the north side of the house and few on the south side. So the homeowners (who need to work all damn day just to pay for the monstrosity) have to pay to burn fossil fuels to heat the house, which is almost assuredly more house than they need. One of my stepsisters and her husband built a nice, modest-by-suburban-standards house in the country. They own dozens of acres of land, many of them wooded. There's no woodstove in that house. They heat it entirely with propane. Kevin and I use the wood from their land to heat our home, and the furnace has come on just a few times this winter.

I'm ranting now, and moving further and further away from the carefully crafted post abrewin' in my head. But this should give you an inkling of our plans.

More to come.

So Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

Where the dogs of society howl;
You can't plant me in your penthouse,
I'm going on back to my plow.

Back to the howlin' old owl in the woods
huntin' the horny-back toad.

Oh I've finally decided my future lies,
beyond the yellow brick road.

More later.

Country Mice

First, I would like to apologize for the tossed-off quality of my blog entries lately. I'm pretty busy, and taking the time to craft a "I know why the caged rooster doesn't crow"-level entry threatens to suck what's left of my energy right out of me.

That said, Kevin ("Little Allman"), Stevie, and I ventured to Capital City yesterday. Our 6-hour journey was centered around a 45-minute kiddie play at the Cap City Kid's Theatre, cheap tickets compliments of my corporate master.

We started with lunch at Max & Erma's. Max & Erma's used to be a fun, quirky, even unique place to eat. I have fond memories of special outings to M&E's when my siblings and I were kids and they had phones on the tables so you could harass other diners and bathtubs full of ice cream and even a disco floor!

Now, the chain is a chain, with no discernible difference between Applebee's, TGIFridays (ugh! that name!), etc. etc. Just another generic suburban eatery with $8.00 Reubens and $5.00 desserts. But it was free--thanks mom! Sorry for dissing the place.

After that, we headed to the theater. It was an audience-involving, moral-heavy rendition of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. It's funny that something so amusing to children is often so grating to adults. The actors did a fine job--the kids were into it, and Stevie was overemoting at the live action drama of it all. He was contorting in every way possible within the confines of his chair, his fingers stuck in his mouth in odd configurations as if his excitement overrode his brain's capacity for controlling all of his limbs at the same time. But the overly articulate and overly dramatic (and overly loud) actors stretched that 45-minutes into nearly an hour and 15 minutes in adult time!

Ah, I'm being a little too harsh. Though I wouldn't want to see it again, Stevie "loved" it, and it was fun watching the kids go nuts. (At one point, Goldilocks "hid" from Baby Bear in a seat right beside us! Stevie just didn't know what to think of that!)

Afterwards, we went to the big marketplace to buy something so we could validate our parking. We spent $3 on three chocolates. We spent less on the actual parking. Then we twisted Kevin's arm and went to Victorian Park on a perfectly gorgeous January (?) afternoon. Our afternoon away from the house (where all three of us prefer to be pretty much at all times) was all worth it when Stevie found a little plastic bulb from some Christmasy thing at the park. I said that he should keep it as a souvenir of the country mice's trip to the big city. He thought that was a fine idea, put it in a pocket, and proceeded to tell us again of how much he had loved this day.

On A Lighter Note . . .

I fully realized over the Christmas holiday that I am too old and bed-spoiled to sleep on an air mattress on the floor.

It is distressing to have to peel your crying kid off of your leg at day care, telling him "no, you have to stay here" as he sobs "but I don't waaaaant to!"

My favorite gift for Christmas this year was an XM satellite radio system, followed by my Ott-Lite--"true color" for reading and quilting. Also, Stevie, with the financial help of his grandma, picked out a hot mitt for his dad with pictures of Kevin's beloved Tabasco sauce on it. For me, he was leaning towards a bell, but decided that I would like the souvenir-grade ceramic thimble, with "Route 66" written on it, better.

My favorite gift to give was the quilt I made for Kevin's aunt and uncle (even though it wasn't finished), the copper sauce pan I got for my best friend, and the cooking class that I signed my stepdad up for--he seemed genuinely surprised and pleased.

That's it for now!

What President Bush Did to Piss Me Off Today

In all of his shallow, shallow wisdom, Bush is removing the wolves of the far northern Northwest from the protection they enjoy under the Endangered Species Act. This will make it easier for ranchers to kill them. Keep in mind that these wolves were just re-introduced to Montana and Idaho after decades of an indiscriminate predator holocaust.

As of now, ranchers can't kill a wolf unless it is actually attacking livestock--an event that is not unheard of, but much rarer than you are led to believe by the likes of Republicans and Disney movies.

Now, ranchers will be able to blow away wolves who are merely "threatening" to attack livestock. Hmmm . . . preemptive strikes . . . against bad, bad creatures . . . whom the ranchers (isn't Georgie a Ralph Lauren-ish "rancher?") merely believe to be a threat. No, no similarity to foreign policy at all. No similarity to W's INCREDIBLY SELFISH AND STUPID world view.


Remember please, intelligent reader, that most western ranchers are raising their incredibly-bad-for-the-environment sheep (not as bad) and cows (really bad) on federal land--our collective land--that they lease from the government--from us--for incredibly cheap, WAY under the market rate prices. They then expect the government--funded by our money--to "dispatch" any pesky native creatures that may--may-- threaten their livestock. (For God's sake, let's NOT try any natural deterrents, such as dogs, or environmentally-sound choices, such as bison.) They profit, we get a pound of beef for every 16 to 20 pounds of vegetation that their cows rip out of the ground, and the native animals get shot, trapped, and poisoned.

Fuck it. I don't want to care anymore. I'm going to become a Christian Republican today.