Live an economically, socially, spiritually and environmentally responsible life for 2009

helped me move through what could have been a very stressful and challenging year. With the economy, the loss of friends, the workplace issues, hometown disasters… it was a means by which I could take the focus off my immediate situation and look at the bigger picture.

We haven’t received any information per say from the country regarding their recycling policies, but we put our trash out on Tuesdays, with our paper seperated from our organic seperated from our plastic. When I came home everything was gone, including my trashcan. We pondered this for a while, I mean, who steals trashcans? All our neighbors have the same type cans and it just didn’t make sense. Calling the county S. found out that we had to start a new account as the new owners, and the trashcan was leased to the old owners. The woman on the phone didn’t have any information about recycling or seperating our trash, but did want our payment information in exacting detail. The next time trash day rolled around we put out our segregated trash again, this time sans trashcan, and came home to a shiny (metaphorically shiny, it is actually heavy duty black plastic) new trashcan that looks like it will hold 100 gallons, and a plastic crate the size of one of those cardboard mailboxes you get when you have to clean out your desk at work. The big one is for trash, the small one is for recyclable.

We have identified some recycling “dumpsters” around the area where we can drop off papers, magazines, the like, and all our broken down cardboard boxes from moving.

We were walking the dog very regularly through the neighborhood until it became cold and rainy and I started working 70+ hours a week, and met a few neighbors. Everyone is very nice and friendly and all comment on how nice a complex we are in. At Halloween we decorated and gave out all our candy and people said ours was the best house on the block. Ha, wait until next year!

I found two new meetups in the area. One goes as groups to various healthy and vegetarian restaurants around town, and the other gathers in different dog-friendly parks. I will try and get involved with them some after the first of the year.

As for economic resposibility, we bought our house in time to qualify for the $8000 tax credit, and we rearranged our income tax status so that we should be able to claim the full amount, which is going into our 6-month mortgage payment fund. We also are getting the insurance that will pay off the mortgage should one or both of us meet an untimely end. And we are going to look for ways to utilize the $12,000 tax credit for energy efficient home improvements, should it actually come through.

My wife is already lending through kiva.org and after the first of the year I will be to, as a 43T goal.

of our house left behind a closet full of clothes she could no longer wear. They were a couple of years old but she had recently had a baby and hadn’t “gotten her figure back” yet, and didn’t want to haul the clothes to her new home. Maybe we could use them, she suggested. She’s 5’8”, my wife is 5’ and won’t even buy a magazine from the front of the rack where others have touched it.

I boxed up the clothes and took them by City of Refuge and donated them. Later in the day I met one of my coworkers who had worked a volunteer event there with me a few days ago. I told her what I had done and she told me that she had changed clothes and left her street clothes in a gym bag there by mistake after the event. Of course it was gone when she went back, but we laughed at the idea of a homeless person or an abused woman with practically nothing finding her $400 jacket and designer slacks and $200 shoes. I may have laughed a little harder because she’s not a particulaly nice person and that may not have been very spiritually responsible, but what the fuck ever, maybe it taught her detatchment.

1. Viernes solo en espanol: Our mostly latino staff has to communicate in english all week. I am trying to speak only Spanish on Fridays to improve my skills and give them a break. It means, of course, I don’t talk too much on Fridays, but I try, and they are very good about not laughing.

2. Discovering Acro-yoga, a physical practice which blends elements of Yoga, Acrobatics, and Thai Massage. Very beginner level but an incredibly interesting practice.

3. Took numerous books, magazines and DVD’s to Hope Lodge, clothes and furniture to Goodwill, and canned goods to Atlanta Flood Relief.

I’m really excited about this food thing. We really are down to bare bones so it’s not like I can just use existing stuff. I’m happy though because we had developed such bad habits in feeding the kids processed and fast food. We ate way too much sugar and almost no veggies.
One silly discovery was about making bread. I’ve been waiting to get a breadmaker. A friend said, “why don’t you just bake it in the oven?”
how goofy was that!? I used to make all our bread but I forgot I cooked it in the oven. My brain sucks.
There is an organic farm near here that does a box of veggies a week for $40 so I’ll check to see if that is a value.
Costco is also a good choice.
I’m also remembering things my mom taught me. She was the oldest of 9 on a farm in Missouri during the depression. No farm animals here but at least I can bake.
There seem to be other resources online too. I’ll make a list as I find good ones.

I was watching the news this morning and one of the guests was talking about her new book “how to feed a family of 4 for $25 per week” Syncronistically my daughter gave me $100 to go buy groceries, so the challenge is on. I’m adding $25 because there are 5 people with me plus my daughters boyfriends son gets school snacks, breakfast and after school snack here.
The kids eat school lunch so we don’t have to pack it. I’m also going to exclude pet food, cleaning and grooming supplies. Food is super expensive here. We currently spend about $25-40 per day so this will be a change.

Without a good plan today I spent $33
this included dish soap and coffee($3 $7)I also splurged on cookie dough. Need a plan. These kids are not vegetable eaters.

I made chicken and rice, mac and cheese and fried apples. We shall have to work on the veggie adventure.

We have saved a pretty big chunk of cash that will now go towards our downpayment and closing costs and some refurbishing for our house. In the process of scrimping we have learned to do with less, find bargins, seek alternatives, rediscover bartering.

There is a bartering meetup group I joined to trade services with other members of the community.

For the first time in several years, our credit history, tax records, and financial allocations are clean and organized. We know where our money is and where it is going.

We are on track to buy a house in 2009 and take advantage of the $8,000 tax refund for next year.

Got an email from a local nonprofit asking for votes at the Toms of Maine grant site. http://www.tomsofmaine.com/community-involvement/project-sponsorships.aspx One was for the Fi-Do program to increase the number of service dogs here and the other was for a community garden on Molokai. I was so touched by all the grant applications. Just look at how many people want to impact their communities in positive ways. So inspiring.

Went to a peace event at my daughters church and had an inspiring yet surreal experience. The Nobel prize winner Betty Williams was there to speak about peace for children. Here is a link about the work she did in Northern Ireland http://www.peacejam.org/laureates.aspx?laurID=7
She was very human and spoke about the importance of creating peace for children. One of the most moving things she told about was food assistance in Africa and how we really need to solve these problems that are well within our capability as humans. She talked about the number of children that die each day and we do nothing really to help. Other speakers talked about a program called Victory over violence and how we need to teach kids about the root causes of violence and passive violence. The local Domestic Violence assistance progrAm received an award.
Last nights news was about a 5yr old, and an 18 yr old both murdered and raped in the last few weeks.
The bizzare thing was thAt at the end of the evening a group of girls from the church did a dance presentation to “Smooth Criminal” and a rap song. It was very “hoochie” and totally inappropriate. I had to wonder if anyone had told them this. In light of the evening discussion I realized how far we have to go with kids to creat a caring compassionate world.
Then

1. Install an inline water filter in the kitchen. Replace all the commercial cleaners in the kitchen with home made, 100% natural and biodegradable substitutes. Draft a plan to use our “gray water” more effectively.

2. Replace all the lightbulbs with low energy florescents. Intall a hepa filter in the HAVC unit.

3. Have Linda come over and perform a blessing on the house and each of the rooms. Plant some tulips and other bulb flowers along the sidewalk so they are ready to burst up and greet S. every day in the spring.