A Wing and A Prayer, A Sigh and A Care

I'm just gonna jump right in today. My husband just called me to say gas prices went up. Now, normally that wouldn't warrant a whole text message, much less a call. I'm used to seeing the prices vary by week by about 2 or 3 cents. Aren't you? Well how about this whopper! Read it and weep. Gas prices went up a whole 26 cents. Yes. You did not read that incorrectly. Our gas prices rose 26 cents. With my husband having to drive 45 minutes or more to work every day and then again to get back home, this could be the beginning of the end for us. We just recently decided to opt out of the food stamp program b/c we felt we could perhaps make it on our own. Our own government is trying desperately to push us back into the system of handouts on a maybe. You heard correctly again! There isn't even a problem yet! They're raising prices on the /possibility/ of things going completely nuts. So our government is basically saying, "Let's stick it to the poor souls who still have jobs during this time of greater unemployment. Let's see how many more we can drive out of jobs because they can't make it in to work. Oh and while we're at it, let's continue to waste our own natural resources because the sky is blue." Yeah, folks, it makes about that much sense.

So somehow, I have to figure out a way for us to earn more income. We had to drop our dental coverage because it was costing us more than we spent in dental visits per year. You read /that/ right, too. It was a good policy but come on! Spending more to keep it than we did to use it was just a little upside down, if you ask me. Now we're going out of pocket on that but at the time, we thought we'd be able to take care of the normal visits on our own, albeit one person at a time. Oh, well, maybe I should just go to dental tech school. Back to the matter at hand, I guess I better go apply for my business license. I'll be putting stuff up on Etsy if I am able to get that license and I'll post here to notify folks when everything is a go. I might eventually put things up on Artfire if I make enough money through Etsy to cover the monthly fee for premium that Artfire charges. I really need to figure something out. I must. In this nasty economy we have, with a group of money-grubbers at the wheel who could care less about anyone but themselves, well, you have to ask yourself what is going to give next?

I'm so thankful we live in the country. I hope our garden does well this year. We're going to need those veggies. I refuse to pay $2 for second rate lettuce. And at Wal-mart, to boot! I am just so amazed that people will buy that nasty iceberg lettuce for that price. It's a sad day when iceburg lettuce costs more than romaine. Wow. Just wow. I really hope that my milk price doesn't go up. Otherwise, we will be buying a cow...or borrowing one. I won't be able to buy milk if the price goes up. And I can't risk the health of my children by buying second rate milk, either. So, what a conundrum!

So now we need to figure out how to spend money in the best way. The grocery items we purchase rarely, if ever, offer coupons. I've gotten to the point where a coupon being offered to me usually causes me to suspect the item of some kind of nefarious ingredient or chemical. So I'm watching instead for sales. Wal-mart is no longer a guarantee for the lowest price in town, though they still do the price-matching. And if they have a lower price on anything, it's usually for their clothing or for their brand of grocery items. I never shop for clothing at Wal-mart. I usually hit the outlet or bargain stores for that and only at the direst need. I can sew. :) I guess we'll be staying close to home and trimming our eating habits down to bare minimums. I wonder how many others will be having to do the same. You can pretty much bank on it that the politicians will not be among us. And for the record, I'm all about the billionaire who made his money legally being able to keep that money that he earned. He shouldn't have to pay for my kids to get their teeth cleaned. I just want us to have an opportunity to be able to hold a decent job that pays for what we need. I don't want a handout. I'd rather have the opportunity to succeed at something. But it looks like it's going to be very hard to even do that for now.

Remember to breathe.