Why I will be purchasing appliances soon.

Laundry day is always "fun" for me.  At best, it's a short walk across the apartment grounds with a bulky, heavy basket in hand.  At worst, it has been a mess of broken washers, lost money, and stolen laundry baskets.  Today was probably an "in-the-middle" day. 

The first mistake I made was to leave without enough quarters.  Any time you leave the house without enough quarters for the washer, you know you're in for trouble.  I wasn't too worried though, I would just stop by the coin machine at the car wash when I stopped to put air in my tires.  

Nope.  Plan fail.  Coin machine non-operable today.  Shoot.  As I walked back to the car, I thought about my options.  "I could go to the laundromat up the street."  I almost turned the car toward the main road, but then realized two things: That laundromat is almost twice as expensive as the one at the apartment, and I had bread baking in the crock pot.  (Yes, you read that last part correctly.)

So now on to plan B.  I could just make do with the quarters I had.  A quick check to the coin purse revealed enough quarters to wash one load of clothes.  Now I had another dilemma: What should I wash?  I stared at the two baskets in front of me.  Should I was this load so that I could drift off to sleep on fresh, soft sheets?  What about my favorite pair of jeans?  Or that new shirt that I adore so much?  Oh yeah, my stupid work slacks.  I might need clean clothes for work. 

Sigh...what was I going to wash?  "Wait! Even if I wash the clothes, I will need to dry them!  I can't wash the clothes and then not dry them!!"  Sure, I could hang them to dry on the shower curtain or even the DRYING RACK that I bought like I had many times before, but tonight I just wanted the clothes dried now.  It was inconceivable that I wait until the next day to wash and dry the clothes, after I would have been able to stop and get a roll or two of quarters from the bank.  No, I had to find a solution now. 

Vending machine!! I remembered that someone had once told me to feed dollar bills to the vending machines and get quarters back.  Since there is a vending machine in the laundry room, I felt like I had hit the jackpot.  About thirty seconds later, it sounded like I had hit the jackpot too.  I had fed my dollar bill to the machine and kept hearing coin after coin drop into the return.  Was I the recipient of a damaged yet generous machine?  No, I was getting dimes back.  Grr... Now, not only did I still have no quarters, but I lost a dollar bill that could have been turned into quarters.  

Again I was faced with the dilemma of what to wash and the knowledge that I would be turning my bathroom into a makeshift laundry room.  I was discouraged.  Then, suddenly, an idea came to my mind: This vending machine might be spitting out useless dimes, but there were TWO MORE vending machines in the complex.  Out the door of the laundry room and over to the pool area I went.  Yes!  Thank goodness!  Four dollar bills and a walk back to the laundry room later, I had enough quarters to wash AND dry my clothes tonight.

And that, my friends, is why I will be purchasing appliances soon.  Even on the good days when I am smart enough to accumulate the required number of tokens before attempting to start laundry day, it's still an obnoxious process that I'm losing money on in the long run.  So tonight I will spend some time setting up a mini savings account for myself, with the ultimate goal being a new-to-me washer/dryer set.  

Well, once again it is time to close.  That crock-pot bread?  Not the lightest or fluffiest bread I've ever made, and certainly not as good as my Grandma's bread, but overall it's pretty darn good if I do say so myself.   And with that said, it's time to go eat another slice with dinner!

Have a great week everyone!

If I Were A Rich Man...

Last night, due to a combination of disrupted sleep pattern induced insomnia and a screaming ear ache courtesy of my latest illness, I found myself wide awake and staring at the ceiling at 3:30 a.m.  Anytime I find myself in this situation, I don't waste time trying to lull myself back to sleep.  No, I pull out the big guns: my MP3 player and its library.  Such was the case last night.  After a few songs I was on the verge of sleep when the next song started playing: "If I Were a Rich Man" from Fiddler on the Roof.

 Again, wide awake at 3:30 in the morning, I started thinking as the song progressed.  If I were a rich woman, I wouldn't have to work hard.  I wouldn't have to be stuck in an office from 8:30-5:00 each day, keeping up with an endless parade of people, prescriptions, and phone calls.  I figured I'd work part-time- just enough to have "something to do" a few times a week, but leaving me plenty of time to pursue other hobbies.  

If I were a rich woman, I too would build a big house.  I wouldn't be as focused on the staircases as Tevye was, but you can be sure I'd have a wrap-around porch.  Rather than a city house, I'd want a big spread in the country; and I too would have chicks and turkeys and geese and ducks, all squawking just as noisily as they could.  I have a long list of plants that would fill my gardens in the summer and cupboards in the winter.   

Tevye might have wanted the important men to come to him with their problems, but I figured that in my wealth I would have people coming to me for my writing expertise, seeing as how I would have used all that time I lack to sit on my patio and write and build my freelance career.   Rather than a praying in a seat by the eastern wall, I'd be greeting the sunrise from the eastern side of the house as I enjoyed breakfast on that nice porch I'd built.

"LORD who made the lion and the lamb.  You decreed I should be what I am.  Would it spoil some vast eternal plan, if I were a wealthy man?"  As the song ended, so did my little dream world.  I'm sure on many, many levels my life would be nothing like it is if I were in a different position in life.  Just from reading the above paragraphs, if I were a rich woman I'd be more lazy and selfish than I already am!  In light of that, I'd rather keep the people and things that I have now, which have provided me with an extremely blessed life, than risk that happiness and joy for something as fleeting as wealth.  Deep thoughts for a Sunday night, I know. 

So as another weekend comes to a close and I'm forced to deal with the fact that work is less than twelve hours away,  I'll just have to keep dreaming that I'm wealthy enough to not have to think about going to work.  Ha.