Perpetual thrift shoppers living on a shoestring and still lovin it

                           Homemade patio fountain

On Facebook today I was looking at a post from a site I follow.  The site talks about growing food not lawns and it extolled the virtues of raising chickens.  One reason: 'It's easy' seemed to offend a lot of people.  People complained it was 'hard' having to shovel chicken manure, getting too many eggs sometimes and not many other times.  Well, yes, it does take some physical labor which squelches that idea of chickens, right there for many people. Chickens do lay a lot of eggs in spring and summer and taper off in winter months.  Hell, I didn't blame them, I wouldn't want to lay eggs in cold weather either. That's why a lot of eggs sometimes and fewer at other times.  Geesh.

I have to laugh at people.  I've raised not only chickens, but goats and rabbits, never finding any of them to be hard to care for.  I've raised large vegetable gardens as well, to feed my family.  Yes, yes, it takes a fair amount of physical labor which seems to be dirty words these days.  By shoveling all that fertilizer, I had one of the best gardens in my entire life, both flowers and food.

Right now we live in the city.  But it is a place where we can have a vegetable garden and lots of pretty flowers, all using a lot of physical labor to achieve.  Last year we trucked in some excellent topsoil to create our vegetable garden.  A small garden, yet it produced more than enough food for our needs, all winter long.  A neighbor behind our fence stopped by to compliment us on our lovely vegetables and since we had plenty, we shared cucumbers and zucchini with him.  He said he was watching us as we assembled the plot and it looked like a lot of work. Uh Huh  Again with the a lot of work statement.

                      Our garden in its infant stage

When I was working in an office, I recall many coworkers saying how they had to get to the gym to workout.  Me?  I simply would go home, change, work in my gardens and relieve much of the day's stress.  Aren't workouts at a gym hard work?  At home, I can dig, hoe and lean on my tool's handles, watch the birds, breathe the air and relax.  I could never do that on a damned treadmill.  I cannot understand paying 'only $30 a month' (by the way, that is over $300 a year to get exercise, when my exercises can produce pretty and useful items, not just sweat and line the pocket of a fitness club.

I understand that some city people cannot have a garden in those worthless housing developments.  Why in hell do you think it's the reason we never would live there?  The Housing dictator people won't allow clothes lines much less something useful like a vegetable garden.  Yeah, I wanna buy a house where a committee dictates to me what I can and cannot have in my yard that I pay for.  I think not.  We did rent a place for three years where we couldn't have vegetable gardens and we gained weight sitting on our asses.  We decided: Enough, and moved to a place where we can have a garden.  Well in the past year, eating mostly our own organic produce, I've lost over 40 pounds and feel great again. Without paying $30 a month so some gym can pay for all that unnecessary equipment.  We aren't allowed to have chickens in the city, but are fortunate enough to live in an older house that was once a farm.  You know, before the city grew and all this progress took over.  The soil is very rich and fertile and we grow some very pretty flowers from seed. 

This is the first year we purchased a small tiller, but much of the soil we have turned over with shovels.  I laugh because as we travel around this city, there are acres and acres of lawns and no gardens.  Why?  The really funny part is people here are often too lazy to even mow their grass.  It's gotten so bad the city counsel has to send city trucks around to check and then mail people letters to mow their lawns.  If not mowed then the city fines them $50 and if still not mowed, the city mows it and charges $100 for that.  How pathetic is it that people no longer have ambition to even mow?  I guess I'm mystified by a generation too lazy to exert much more energy than thumb exercises on cell phones and video games.  Wake up!

                   Flowers in our yard grown from seed

So yes, I laugh at people who have to buy yoga pants and go to a gym, pay gym fees and say 'raising chickens is a lot of work.'  Well, duh! 

                   The vegetable garden as it got bigger


The first picture here is the homemade patio fountain we made ourselves.  I wandered around looking at fountains much smaller costing over $400.  Nope.  We paid $20 for the tiered centerpiece, $50 (a long time ago) for the pump and $2.00 for the bottom piece which is a kid's wading pool.  It looks and sounds great.  So, still decorating on a shoestring and loving it.  

Social Work in a nursing home,you're too fat

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There is a book about Social Work in a nursing home that gives you details concerning MDS charting and much more technical information.  While that's nice, those are things you will be trained on while on the job.  What you cannot find in most books is how to really do a good job in a nursing home by having a good attitude about dealing with residents, coworkers and families, all of which you encounter on a daily basis.

Now while I do not fat discriminate, lord knows I too have struggled with weight, I do have a problem with large dietitians who will tell residents and families: "Mary Smith must lose weight and is being placed on a 1500 calorie a day diet."  The dietitian at the last nursing home I worked at, was telling us about a recent seminar she attended and was surprised that most of the dietitians attending were, in fact, very over weight.  The dietitian at our nursing home weighed around 120 pounds.  She asked how can anyone seriously take losing weight advice from fat people?  She has a good point.

Back when I was a nursing assistant, my class was taught by a nurse who was obese.  She told us: "This is how to lose weight.  You need to watch your calories and get your heart rate up enough to burn fat."  She was 250 pounds at the very least.  Seriously?  All of us in the class discussed that topic over lunch that day.

The VA has told my husband he needs to see a nutritionist about a sensible diet.  Many of us have been there.  While waiting for an appointment, we have been more active, eating more sensibly and our tummies are slowly melting away.  

Like many people I knew what and how we should be eating, I simply ignored it for too long.  I was a vegetarian for over 15 years in my younger days and weighed around 113 pounds for most of my adult life.  Once I got older, I decided to enjoy many foods I had denied myself and consequently, put on the pounds.  Most of us do know how we should eat, but do not always go there.  

As a Social Worker, you might encounter an over weight dietitian telling residents how to lose pounds.  It will be difficult when residents and families ask you how they can believe or take such advice from a person who is clearly not eating right.  "Physician heal thyself."  Comes to mind for me.