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Happy Halloween! 🎃
We had a fun Lyra photo shoot yesterday evening inspired by Halloween. I got some good pics out of it. My flexibility with Star on the Bar (my favorite pose) continues to improve. 🌟 
Yesterday at the clinic we had a Halloween party. There was costume & pumpkin decorating contests as well as other fun games. Lots of good food as well. It was a fun event. 👻We survived Hurricane Zeta with little local damage. There was more damage in the New...
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This is a test blog as I've already lost 3 blog entries. 🎃👻
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Not much going on.  Still going into work everyday.  Net worth went down due to stock market.  Debt is down.  
 
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I have no plans to leave the house today, so I'm pretty sure I will do no spending.  Therefore, I put together my October recap:
Home Repair/Maintenance: $872
Housing: $824
Car Repair/Maintenance: $672
Utilities: $201
Furnishings/Equipment/Decor: $143
Groceries: $124
Gifts/Charity: $75
Vet/Pet Supplies: $71
Household Supplies: $67
Eating Out/Takeout: $53
Phone: $51
Gas: $34
Medical/Health: $26
Laundry: $15
Entertainment: $9
Grand Total: $3237
Variables: ...
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Today is my 60th birthday! When I was very little, and didn't understand the concept of Halloween, I thought that dressing up in costumes and going door to door to get candy with my little neighborhood friends was all for my birthday! We would always have a family dinner, then invite my friends and thier parents over for cake and ice cream. Then we would all dress up and go trick or treating. Such good memories. 
As I reflect on where I am today, I feel very content and happy...
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Well on tuesday our roof came up with a leak..what was better was we had house inspection so she saw it for herself...she said she would get someone on it...someone came out thursday..and it was a bigger wetter spot on the roof (around 60 plus cm) they came out and said it was the air con leaking..so turned the water off and poked 2 holes in the roof to let it drain...and then left...haven't heard anything since...so who knows what is happening...hopefully we will hear something...
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I started blogging here twelve years ago. I lost all of my entries a while back when the site had technical problems; I was never able to recover any it. Anyway, here I am. Life has taken many turns in those twelve years. We put our two sons through school with no debt, invested in rental property, I left my well-paying job, found a part-time job that I loved making a fraction of what I was making, hubby retired and we tried snowbirding in Florida, but it did not work out, COVID...
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I got my Google AdSense payment this week and that, along with it being a third paycheck month for DH, brought our income around $300 higher this pay period.  Citi is so high because DS owes me some money for an order he made, which he will pay me later, but I wanted to pay it off before the due date hit so no interest.  When he pays me back I will put that money into the Emergency Fund.  Another reason Citi was so high was we got a lot of takeout due to my being...
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There was $66.00 left in the grocery envelope from last payday so I transferred that to the freezer fund.  There wouldn't have been anything left if I'd been well enough to go to the store one more time on one of the meat sales, but I'm glad there was something to transfer just because we are getting close now on having enough money to purchase the freezer we want.  Next month I might actually be able to put it into the budget as a sinking fund amount, but not quite sure...
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I've been away for a while and see there's been some issues with posts...hope that has been resolved! I really like the much wider field when you're typing your post here.
I'm having a rare moment and feeling bored. Heavy rain changed my plans yesterday (the one time each week I interact with a live human being) and today it's snowing! Enjoying a cup of tea just now.
I was able to check a certain website online and see that my early absentee vote was indeed processed. Gave me...
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Debts
Mortgage -$122,309.94 (-$230.57)Medical Loan #2 -$4,700 (-$500)
Savings
Roth IRAs +$16,380 (+$268)401K +$30,317 (+$735)Emergency Fund +$8,284 (+$212)Animal Fund +$938 (+$0)Truck Fund +$2,030 (+$5)HSA +$2,524 (+$250)
Overall: +$2,200.57
Markets went up a bit. Slowly picking at debts and savings. Still waiting on insurance reimbursement from July. 
*****Thought I would let you know that I am working on a new website that will showcase personal finance blogs. https://budgetbloggers.com/
If...
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I notice that many of our blogs are food oriented lately. Maybe it is the cooler weather or perhaps we are all foodies at heart. 
I was going through the freezer and noticed I still had some slices of ham there. I pulled them out to defrost and decided to use them for two different meals. One is for tonight -- quiche. It's dark and damp here today and nothing makes me happier than to have a hot meal from the oven when the weather is like this. Thursdays are usually egg night...
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My ex's birthday was a few days ago, and I went to the family party.  It was a Mexican-themed meal, and I took Mexican slaw.  I brought home a good portion of it, as well as leftover enchiladas and Mexican rice.  I froze the enchiladas in meal portions.  Yesterday I turned the leftover slaw and rice into soup, adding a chicken soup base.  Today I'm going to add a little chicken to it, to make it heartier, and then I'll freeze it, after I eat one portion. ...
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I have about an hour before I will be presenting online on emergency preparedness with my work team.  I do not enjoy presenting and am not one of those who think the more you do it, the easier it becomes.  I will be SO GLAD when this is over.  
A few weeks ago, the hub and I went to dinner with friends to a steak house.  It was quite the experience in that you only choose steak or chicken and everything else is served family style. (salad, bean soup, main meal...
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I've been on antibiotics for five days and this morning I did not have to reach for the nasal spray first thing in the morning.  I'm still a little stuffy, but I can breathe without the assistance of Afrin and I can't remember the last time that happened.  I have a really puffy face from the prednisone, but I've only got to take it for two more days and then that will go away.  I'll be on the antibiotics a while longer, though.  I still feel a little disassociated...
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The lack of progress on the blogs is really starting to frustrate me.  I know it’s a platform change and that just makes everything drag out longer.  It looks like a better system when I can get into it.  At least one from this century anyway.
So, I added up the numbers and this is what we have harvested this year:
102 pounds of potatoes
5 pounds of bell peppers
5 pounds of Anaheim mild chile peppers
3 pounds of serrano chile peppers
6 pounds of Trident...
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Things have been trucking along here in the days of a non-functional blog platform.  Mostly, I've been canning beef.  They had a massive sale on chuck roast, $2.99 a pound, at Fred Meyer on the last ad flyer and no limit.  I went in 3 times and ended up with a total of 34 roasts.  I did check with the meat guy and he said people just weren't stocking up and to take what I wanted because if it didn’t sell they’d grind it into hamburger.  I always...
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Today was a street-sweeping day and I had to move my car.  While I was out, I took a swing past the library drop-off bin and the post office mailbox.  When I came back home, there were no parking places to be had.  I mean, there were NONE in a three-block area.  I gave up looking, because I was just driving round and round.  I decided to do other things instead.  First I went to McDonalds to get breakfast, because I was starving.  I spent $3 there. ...
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GIFTS:
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$50 Barnes & Noble
$20 x 6 Target
 
MOVIES:
--------
$100 Regal
 
RESTAURANTS:
------------
$50 Cracker Barrel
$50 Olive Garden
$25 Chili's
$ 25 x 2 Jamba Juice (Birthday Gift)
 
RETAIL:
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$ 50 x 3 Target
 
Note: Edited over time to remove used gift cards. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Had to redo entry, with new format.
In the end, I found some nice bed sheets to...
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So I wrote 3 blogs all which didn't show up so will try to do a catch up in as short version as I can!
So our savings for our house deposit was going great until my daughter stareted getting sick (she is never sick) so she went to see the doc and she needs surgery...we don't want her to wait or get sicker so we are paying for it (almost 9000) but she will be paying us back, and I have a contract drawn up and signed already...she didn't have a job the last couple months due to...
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