Poor, poor Chauncy

A couple of weeks ago I was awoken at about 6:00 a.m. to the sound of birds thrashing in their cage. I sat still in bed, waiting to see if it would happen again. It did, only it didn't stop. I ran downstairs and threw on all the lights to see my lutino cockatiel Chauncy covered in blood and clinging to the side of his cage. Blood was splattered everywhere. You know that episode of Mad Men where the guy's foot gets run over by the John Deere mower? Yeah, it was kind of like that.

Cockatiels can't see in the dark, and they can get frightened by noises and sudden movements (even if they have a nightlight, as Chauncy does). Since birds' natural reaction when frightened is to fly away, they start thrashing around in their cage, and they can injure themselves pretty badly. This last night fright wasn't Chauncy's first, but it was certainly his worst. Seriously, there was blood everywhere. It was splattered on the walls and all over the cage, and even worse it was dripping from Chauncy's wing (where he had broken a blood feather) into a small pool on the bottom of the cage. I grabbed Chauncy and applied some paper towels to his wing to stop the bleeding. (There's actually a powder you can buy to stop bleeding but I don't have any of it. I obviously need to get some.) Once my shoddy first-aid was applied, Chauncy just sat on my finger and let me scratch his head. After a few minutes I put him back in the cage and went back to bed. The next morning I spent a good half hour scrubbing up the blood and disinfecting everything. I also took Chauncy into the shower and got all the blood cleaned off of him, too. I'm happy to say that he's much better now. But here are some gross pictures, just for entertainment value.

The bloody cage

The blood-spattered wall

The blood-covered wing. Blerg!

And here he is happy and healthy, and giving you the stink-eye.

Cheapskate

When I was eleven I went to the grocery store with my dad. Going to the store with Dad was fun because he actually listened to you when you started hounding him to buy item A or product B. My mom had learned years earlier to leave us kids at home or, failing that, to tune us out for as long as she could and then threaten beatings when she couldn't ignore the whining anymore. I didn't know it at the time, but that trip to the grocery store would forever change how I looked at money management.

Everything Dad bought that day, from baggies to cereal, was store brand. Having been quite effectively brainwashed by television commercials for brand-name products, I was horrified. "No, Dad!" I urged, "Buy the Zip-Loc baggies! They're better!"

"How are they better?" He demanded.

How are they better? How are they better?! Well, let's look at the packaging, for one thing. The colors! The professional design job! Everything about the packaging screamed superiority. But that argument didn't fly with my dad.

"They're exactly the same," he insisted. "And I'm not spending four dollars for something I can get for two."

At the time I thought he was a total dweeb. Now that it's my hard-earned money on the line, I'm singing a different tune.

At the grocery store I almost always buy the store brands. I do make an exception for my shampoo and conditioner because I've tried cheaper brands and I just prefer the way Herbal Essences makes my hair feel and smell. But other than that, it's store brands all the way, baby. I've also started clipping coupons. And when I say "clipping coupons," I mean, "printing them from online."

You should totally check out:
savvyshopperdeals.com
shortcuts.com
heraldextra.com/coupons (I think that might only be good for Utah)

They have tons of great coupons, and Savvy Shopper Deals' shopping wizard is totally awesome because it ranks how good the deals are (Wow!; Great; and Good). Seriously, go check them out. You'll save a grip of cash.

And before I buy anything online I always check to see if there's a coupon code for it (there almost always is). I've saved money on Papa John's pizza and shipping, among other things, and just recently Kristen saved sixteen bucks on a new camera because she Googled the site name + coupon code. Buying an airplane ticket? Find the flight you want on a site like Travelocity, then go right to the airline's website and buy the ticket through them. You'll save the $10 booking fee. Because, as Dad said, why spend more for the exact same thing?

When in doubt, haggle. Three years ago I would have been mortified at the thought of haggling for something in a respectable shop, but after seeing a segment on the Today show about haggling and how much money you can save, I decided to give it a try. Last year my sister had her eye on a bench at Pier 1. We went in one day to browse, and she noticed the bench was on sale. It was marked down from about $300 to $189, which was still a bit out of my sister's comfort zone. The sales person came over to see if we needed any help or had any questions. "Well, here's the thing," I told her. "We love this bench, but I don't know that we $189 love it." She went to talk to her manager and informed us that they could reduce the price to $99. I was floored. I thought they might be willing to drop the price to $150, but never in my wildest dreams did I think they would sell it to us for $99. I used the same tactic a while later at a little local shop, and they gave me 15% off. Just because I asked nicely. I'm not saying it always works, but it sure doesn't hurt to ask.

So, yes, I am a cheapskate. Along with pale skin and freckles, a hatred of sports, love of animals, and obsession with correct spelling and grammar, it's just one more thing I've gotten from my dad.

So, now that I've told you how I save money, how about you tell me how you save money?

People I would like to punch in the face

Here are some people I would really like to punch in the face (in no particular order and not necessarily for any particular reason):

Michael Moore
Ann Coulter
Eddie Murphy
Laurent Ruquier
Bill Maher
Hillary Clinton
Bill Clinton
Susan Sarandon
The Barenaked Ladies
The checker at Target with the crappy "THUG" prison tat on his arm who's always grumpy
Bill O'Reilly
The idiots who have kept The Simpsons on the air ten years longer than they should have
The idiots who canceled Arrested Development and Futurama
The A-hole who teased me all through elementary school and junior high (sadly, he's still alive and hasn't died a horrible, horrible death)
Michael Douglas
Jane Fonda
Whoever wrote/composed "The Monster Mash"
My old boss(es)
Child and animal abusers and rapists (Let's all line up and form a punching machine on those guys)
Lindsey Lohan
Howard Stern
Kanye West
Martha Stewart
Perez Hilton (Thanks, Will.i.am!)

Who would you like to punch in the face?

Washing the couch

This post is being written as I lie on my stomach, teetering on a pile of slightly damp microfiber pillows. Usually I write my posts (and do pretty much everything except go to the bathroom) nestled in the bosom of my super comfortable couch. But today that's just not possible.

Yesterday I looked at my carpet (dotted with little puppy accidents) and my couch (covered in dog hair and dirtied a shade darker than the beautiful beige it was when I bought it five years ago), and decided it was time for a deep clean. The carpet was easy; I got out the old carpet cleaner and gave it a nice, luxurious washing. Next up, I pulled some of the covers off my couch and gave them a test wash in my washing machine. I was so, so careful, washing them in warm water and the expensive detergent my cousin left here when she moved. I dried them a little in the dryer, and they came out perfect. So I pulled all the rest of the cushion and pillow covers off the couch and threw them in the wash too. After they were clean I put them in the drier on the lowest setting. That's where things took a turn for the worst.

Before the drier had even finished its work, my spidey senses started tingling, telling me something was wrong. I took the covers out of the drier while they were still damp. My heart sank. The darker fabrics didn't take too well to the drying. For lack of another word, they bubbled. The darker the fabric, the more severe the bubbling. Forlorn, I searched the interwebs for a solution to my problem, but in vain. There was no hope to be had. So I grabbed a throw pillow and sat on it. I sat on it until my bum was damp and cold and I was uncomfortable, or about five minutes. I pulled the pillow out from underneath me to see that its appearance had returned to normal. Hurrah! I quickly grabbed the other affected pillows, threw them in a pile on the floor and did a belly flop on top of them. So here I am. Lying on the floor, blogging. I don't know if this will be a permanent solution to my problem, although I pray it is.

This whole thing is really sad; the covers are all super clean and back to their brand-new color. It will be such a bummer if a few bubbly pillows ruin it.

"That's what she said" Thursday

I had my parents over for dinner Monday night (because I'm a good daughter like that). At the end of the meal, my mom started stacking dishes and said:

"Here, you can put your stuff on my stuff, and--"

Me and Dad: "That's what she said!"

Then we laughed and high-fived each other.

"That's what she said" Thursday

Work has been slow and even stagnant at times the last few weeks. Needless to say, I'm feeling the stress of watching money go out while no money comes in. So it was with a huge sigh of relief that I saw a new project from my best client waiting for me in my inbox a few minutes ago. I started the download and started whispering to myself:

"Please let it be a big one, please let it be a big one, please let it be a big one..."

Then I grinned and began chuckling, "That's what she said, that's what she said, that's what she said..."

Seriously, though, I do hope it's a big one.











That's what she said.

Calling closure

So remember that time I was supposed to go meet with one of the bishop's counselors and I just knew I was going to get a calling? But then I got sick and had to cancel the meeting? Well, they finally tracked me down again and called me in for the meeting wherein they would ruin my life by calling me as a primary teacher or nursery leader. I girded my loins and went in.

I was delightfully shocked when it turned out my new calling wouldn't involve dealing with anybody under the age of eighteen, or even demand more than, say, half an hour a month. After all my worst-case-scenarioing (shut up, it's a word), it turns out that I got the absolute awesomest calling I could ever hope to get!

VISITING TEACHING SUPERVISOR!!!

Hallelujah! I had this calling back during my BYU days. It wasn't a big deal at all. People either call you and tell you they got their visiting teaching done, or you call them at the end of the month, they tell you they didn't do it, and you mark it down. So. Freaking. Awesome!

Needless to say, this is some very, very good news!

But it still wasn't funny when the counselor sent me on my way with a teasing, "Don't worry, I'm sure next time we call you in it will be to call you as a primary teacher."

Ha. Ha.

Thanks, K-Lo!

I absolutely love getting stuff in the mail, so much so that I look forward to getting the mail every day on the off chance that maybe somebody sent me something or that something will arrive from Amazon that I totally forgot I ordered. Most days that isn't the case and my mail consists only of weekly circulars and bills. But today! Today I got a package from Kristen! I was super psyched! I got the package home and tore into it. Inside I found a dog toy, a bag of doggy treats, and a card congratulating me on my adoption of Baby Milo. How nice is that?! Most people, when I told them about the new puppy, called me "crazy" and/or accused me of being a "hoarder," but Kristen was sweet enough to sincerely congratulate me. That was awesome enough, but puppy presents on top of it is honestly one of the nicest things anybody's ever done for me (seeing as I've never had/probably never will have wedding or baby showers). And was Milo as excited about his presents as I was?


You be the judge.


Thanks again, Kristen!

Meet Baby Milo

I'll be the first to admit that I'm a sucker for animals, especially puppies. I like to think of my love for animals as a positive thing; it means I have a heart. I don't trust anybody who doesn't love puppies. What kind of sicko doesn't look at puppies and think they're adorable? But I'm getting off track. I'm trying to say that it was this love of adorable puppies that caught me off guard last Saturday when my sister and I ran to WalMart* to pick up a few quick items.

Walking up to the door I saw a mother and her son standing there with a tiny chihuahua puppy at their feet. "Look at the baby!" I squealed at my sister! "It's a baby!" I ran up and started scratching the puppy's tiny ears. "Are you selling him?" I asked. They informed me that they were, indeed, selling him, so I picked him up. It couldn't hurt to just snuggle him a bit, right? He licked my face in excitement, then settled in for a snuggle. I'm always curious to know how much people are asking for their puppies, so I asked. "$100.00," they replied.

A hundred bucks?! Are you kidding me? Your average chihuahua puppy runs around $400-$600. The price caught me off guard. I don't have a problem walking away from a $400 puppy when I'm not in the market, but $100 is something to think about. I snuggled the puppy a few seconds longer, then looked at my sister, a wide grin slowly spreading across my face. "I'm getting him," I announced. "You're crazy," she declared, but obviously excited I was getting the puppy.

It took a good part of the day, but I finally decided to name the new baby Milo. There were several serious contenders, but they didn't fit as well with the other dog names, Daphne and Roxy. Milo. It'll work. The second my mom saw me walking up with the puppy she asked, "How much did you pay for it?"

"A hundred bucks."

"I will give you one hundred dollars for it," she said matter-of-factly.

My sister had made me the same offer just a few minutes earlier. I politely refused both offers. Milo was mine.

So it's been a week and a half since Milo joined our furry, feathery, and scaly family. For the most part it's a blast. He's so cute and snuggly and likes to take naps on my chest while we lounge on the couch. He also loves to play with the bigger dogs and has a hilarious little bark. The stuff that's not cool is that puppies are a lot of work (I should know, Milo is the third puppy I've raised). I'm going to go ahead and make the completely uninformed declaration that puppies are harder to deal with than a newborn baby (but not older babies that can move around). I have to get up to take Milo out in the middle of the night--sometimes twice. He also requires constant vigilance lest I turn my head for one minute and turn around to find him chewing on an electrical cord (one of his favorite naughtinesses) or peeing on my carpet. To combat the latter, I adhere to a strict potty training regime that involves taking Milo out after he eats, drinks, sleeps, or plays, and every twenty minutes in between. He has already proven to be easier to potty train than Daphne or Roxy because he goes to the bathroom the second you take him outside--no waiting around begging, "Go potty! Go potty!" With both Daphne and Roxy I'd stand outside for twenty minutes at a time and have to walk around backward to keep them from sitting on my feet because the grass was too cold for their tiny feet. Ah, the joys of children!

*Lest you think I'm in the habit of buying puppies in front of the WalMart on a whim, you should know this is the first time I've ever bought a dog in this manner, and afterward I was like, "Holy crap, I can't believe I just bought a puppy from strangers at the WalMart." Every other time I've bought a pet I've given it serious thought and reflection before heading out to buy a new animal. I also firmly believe that when you take in an animal, you have a responsibility to keep that animal and provide the best care you can until either you or it die. If you get a pet with the idea that you can always get rid of it if you decide you don't want it anymore, then you shouldn't be getting one in the first place. There, I'll climb off my soapbox now.

Schedules

I might have to break down and make myself one of those schedule things. I used to have an unofficial schedule where I'd get up, go to work, come home, work out, watch TV, and go to bed. Ever since I quit my job, my schedule has slowly declined into wake up, lounge on couch in pajamas/work, watch TV, go to bed. I've gone from getting dressed six days a week to maybe putting on some clothes I found on the floor about twice a week. Seriously, you know it's bad when you're too gross to even go through the McDonald's drive-thru for lunch.

Yeah, it's time to get a schedule. And I guess showering should go somewhere on it...

Bread baking

My grandma used to bake really good bread. Whenever we visited, we'd have thick slices of homemade toast and jam for breakfast. It was heaven. But for some reason Grandma quit baking bread. I don't know why. Probably because she was tired of baking loaves upon loaves of bread only to have us descend like locusts and clear out every last crumb. Now she buys bagged bread like the rest of us. Toast and jam at Grandma's just isn't the same anymore.

I asked her a couple of years ago if she would give me her recipe. "Oh, honey," she chuckled. "It's just a plain old white bread recipe." I didn't push the issue, even though I didn't know any plain old white bread recipes, and subsequent comparisons of recipes found online and in my few meager cookbooks turned up more variances than common points. I've tried a few bread recipes over the past couple of years, but none of them come anywhere close to Grandma's.

Today I remembered that before he died my grandpa compiled small binders of family recipes for everybody. Maybe Grandma's bread recipe is in there! I hoped. Navigating the recipes didn't turn up Grandma's recipe, but I did discover my great-grandma's bread recipe. My great-grandma died when I was eight years old, but I still remember (and she's still hailed for) her really great dinner rolls. So I decided it would be worth a shot to bake a batch of her bread.



I got out the Kitchen-Aid mixer and all the ingredients. I began following the recipe, but started suspecting something was off when it called for six cups of water. SIX. CUPS. I became more worried as the bowl filled with each cup I added. Why didn't it occur to me that Great-Grandma's bread recipe would yield more than a loaf or two since she, like my grandma, probably baked bread rather than buy it from the store. My optimism that all the dough would fit in the bowl slowly dwindled as I began adding cup after cup of flour, turning the concoction from soup into glue before it was finally too much to be contained. With a heavy heart I resigned myself to the idea that I would have to knead by hand instead of letting the dough hook do all the work. I sprinkled flower on the counter and poured the massive dough baby on top. I added more flour, kneaded, flour, kneaded, and so on, until almost the entire new bag of flour was gone and the dough seemed to be the right consistency.

I then set it aside to let it rise. After about an hour, I punched it down and kneaded some more. I knew all that dough wasn't going to fit in my two bread pans, so I devised a clever plan for the extra three loaves I got out of the recipe; two would go on a cookie sheet and one would go in the funky-sized pan. I let them rise for half an hour then baked them for about forty minutes. They looked freaking delish and smelled even better!

I patiently let them cool for a while, then, when I couldn't stand it anymore, cut off a thick slice.

It was bland. Not enough salt, too much sugar. I suspected as much when I was making it. I guess Great-Grandma spent so much time perfecting her rolls her bread recipe suffered.





But I'll find a way to gag it down.