April 30, 2008

• But My Feet are Sweaty and a Modern Fairy Tale

  Tucker told me this morning that its too warm for him to comfortably go to school.  He says that yesterday his feet even got sweaty. 

  He's going to school, in spite of his sweaty feet. 

  ******

  Thank you for all the love you gave me yesterday.  I have been (obviously) thinking a lot about what it means to be healthy and about why it is that I'm so paranoid about my lack of health insurance.  I'm a generally healthy person.  I get the standard issue colds and flu from time to time and I have seasonal allergies.  But I'm not sickly. 

  I'm in a season of life when I'm extremely unlikely to become pregnant.  I mean I might meet someone tomorrow, fling caution to the winds and so forth, but as I said, that's extremely unlikely. 

  You'd think that health insurance companies would be lining up to take me on as a client.  They would be getting at least a couple thousand dollars for their service over the next year, and I'm unlikely to use more than a couple hundred because well, it has been a long time, so I should probably be thinking about a check-up.  But then I'm good to go for at least another ... five? years. 

  ******

  I know how to lose weight.  I can do that.  It's pretty easy.  Every time you feel hungry, you go to the refrigerator and check the "list" of alternatives to eating that you have thoughtfully posted on the door.  My list looks like:

  • read a book
  • go for a walk
  • give yourself a pedicure
  • give your hair a hot oil treatment
  • manicure your nails
  • light a candle
  • blow bubbles on the patio
  • create a new scrapbook page
  • listen to (or make up) a song
  • set out fresh potpourri
  • write a poem
  • call your sister
  • give yourself a facial
  • take a nap
  • change into an outfit that goes with your highest heeled patent red pumps

  Once a week you weigh yourself and whenever you reach a new "five pound" mark, or if you've met some other goal like five days in a row of recording your food, or a week in which you stayed within your daily calorie goals, you give yourself a treat. 

  • new book
  • an hour in the bubble bath
  • new song for the iPod (thank you Mary)
  • string beads for something new

  When you reach a major milestone like 25 total pounds lost, new dress size etc, you give yourself a major treat.

  • new shoes
  • new outfit
  • new boyfriend

  A monumental goal acheivement such as hitting a 50 pound mark is worth a monumental treat such as having the Merry Maids over to clean the apartment. Which I can afford to do because I will have saved that much money off my grocery bill in the months it took to get there. 

  *******

  Today is the last day of April, so I'm happily adding up my house account to see whether there's progress and I can report that this month I added enough money to buy approximately 6.5 square feet someday.  Tucker has been paying attention to the house saga and he asked me about it last night.  "If the bank would be willing to loan you the money, why wouldn't you just take it?"

  I thought about trying to explain about taxes, interest rates, PMI, home repairs, budgeting and so forth then I realized there was an easier way so I told him it's like the Three Little Pigs. 

  Remember the first little pig?  And the load of straw?  He got a house, but the financing materials weren't very solid, so the  rise in the prices of gas, eggs, bread, and shoes put a huge strain on his budget and when the big bad wolf came to collect the house payment the pig had no money left so what happened?  The house fell down and he was worse off than before.

  The second little pig did a little better, he had a larger downpayment, a little better financing, and his house was more solid, but then that fall there was an accident where a driver with no insurance ran a redlight and smashed into the little pig's car totaling the car and putting the little pig in the hospital for two days.  Since the other driver was uninsured and the little pig had a high deductible, he owed thousands of dollars in medical bills and had to buy a new car to get to work.  So when the big bad wolf came for the house payment there was no money left and ....

  The third little pig had not only herself but two littler pigs depending on her to make wise choices so she waited until she got solid bricks to build with (best interest rate, excellent credit rating, 20% down payment, and a seller willing to pay closing costs).  Made sure there was a cushion of money in the account and adequate budgeting to cover the monthly bills plus continue to put a little more aside for emergencies.  So when the big bad wolf came to collect the pig wrote a check and the wolf had to go away.  And when the wolf came back?  The pig wrote another check and the wolf had to go away leaving the pig alone to pick the apples in her orchard. 

  The big bad wolf was tricky and said, "Housing prices have fallen in your area so your house isn't worth as much and I'm going to make you pay PMI."  (That's the mortgage equivalent of the wolf trying to sneak down the chimney.)  The little pig lit a fire under the cauldron in the fireplace and boiled that old wolf so the wolf got NO check and a blister on his tail.  That's because the little pig was smart when she chose her neighborhood, and had a recent appraisal showing that her home had more than maintained it's value. 

  So the little pig, and the two littler pigs lived happily ever after with plenty of apple pie to eat and a lovely house to keep the rain off their heads. 
  

  • 11:31 am
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