The gods of the weekend started off by breaking our garbage disposal before they sent the deluge. At least they were quiet about it. There was no fanfare; no crashing or screeching noise. It was a ‘no drama’ moment, the kind where you flip the switch and receive only a low hum in return. Fine. Okay. We’ll just add that to the list of things to be accomplished this weekend. We are currently busting our butts getting our house ready to photograph so it can go on the military rental websites by the end of November.  A garbage disposal is the least of our concerns and hey, maybe we Mike won’t need to replace it for another 15 years.

Pouring rain. we call this Lake Lucerne.

We spent last night buying some bedroom furniture at Ikea, since we’re renting our house furnished and we were short one bed frame. After a satisfying evening putting the bed together it was time to turn in early because today was a big day and we needed rest. Was today some sort of celebration? Well, perhaps if you have time to actually have fun, today would have been Halloween. Our idea of celebrating Halloween, however,  took the form of dressing up as truck drivers and renting a big red dump truck named Bocephus. (I’m not making this up. That truck is named after Hank Williams, Jr.)

I’m not even going to tell you the name of the outfit where we rented this alleged truck. Let’s just say that this truck had seen a lot of better days. At this point, it was probably held together with safety pins. Apparently you get what you pay for when it comes to dump truck renting because we chose this particular place due not only to its proximity to the huge piles of gravel and mulch we needed, but also for its price. We got the truck for an entire day for less than what the ‘other guys’ charged for 4 hours.  Dump trucks are not cheap. Well, actually this truck was cheap, but still cost plenty if you get my drift. Still, the engine kind of ran if you kept your foot on the gas, and it looked like the brakes worked.  What’s the worst that can happen? So what if the sides bulged a little?

It appears that the mulch is causing that side to bulge, but it’s not.

The thing is, Mike and I actually enjoy this kind of little adventure because it takes us back to our youth when we did things on the cheap as that was the only way we could afford to do things. Sitting up high in Bocephus on that bouncy bench seat, looking down on the traffic surrounding us, we felt both old and young at the same time.  We were hoping for country music, but the radio didn’t work. The truck squeaked and rattled down the road, growling and lurching at passersby as the rain pelted a continuous drill on the roof. Music would have been overkill anyhow.  Mike went over a speed bump and the glove compartment door fell off. We hooted with laughter and prayed that was the only thing that fell off. I thought about scooting over into the middle of the seat to ride next to Mike, but Skippy beat me to it, adding his wet-dog smell to the general atmosphere.  Because it was Halloween, it rained hard and continuously all day long, as is our custom.

Soon we had a wet dog on the seat between us.

Even though we are pretty adventurous souls and you’d think we did this Bocephus truck thing for fun, we actually rented this truck and picked up our own supplies because it saved us money. Unfortunately, all the money we saved doing it ourselves is now going to be spent fixing the front gate because driving a big truck through the gate is not unlike taking a huge, center cockpit full-keeled sailboat into a small marina. You have to watch your rear end carefully or you’ll hit something. So now we have an excellent opportunity to redesign this gate, which we’ve been complaining about for years. See how that works? I mean, it’s as if we are getting a free gate! For the same price as renting a truck for 4 hours at the ‘other guy’s place’, we get a truck for a full day AND a new gate. Are you keeping track of all the projects we’re on top of now? So far, our rental will have a new front gate, a new bed, and a new garbage disposal.

Whoopsie!

After a full day of back-and-forthing between the house and the supplier, Mike was seriously relieved when the truck made it back to the rental place without falling apart.  We figured we’d better stop while we were ahead because one of the gates on the back of the truck looked like it could fall off at any moment and our track record for this weekend had not been that great in the gate breakage department. Plus, after our second load of mulch, the lift on the truck failed and we had to take it back so they could fix it. Then the gravel rake broke in half as soon as I started using it. We believed that one more load could do Bocephus in and we didn’t want that to happen on our watch.

Really?

Tonight, Mike has bought a new garbage disposal. It’s name, as indicated on the box,  is Badger 5. With a name like that, it should be hell for stout.  I am writing this update and considering how many Advil will be necessary for me to get out of the bed in the morning and commence to spreading mulch. I’ve already spent two hours shoveling and raking gravel and there is no end in sight. Therefore: Advil. I forget, when huge piles of gravel and mulch are blocking our driveway, that I am no longer 20 years old.

Tomorrow’s task. There are two other large piles of mulch besides this, and more gravel as well.  Thirty yards of mulch. and 15 yards of gravel. We love us some materials here.

Tomorrow will come and go but I really look forward to Monday.   It’s the day the tree guys come to reduce windage in the tall firs and take out that Mountain Ash tree that I’ve hated for 15 years. That should be fun. Because on that day, we are paying other people to work while we watch. At the rate we’re going, watching is about all we’ll be able to manage. Onward.

it looks like more fun than it is.

This post was originally titled “Things We Did Today” and has been changed because that’s the name of Tammy Swart’s blog, which you can read here.

I am not a good saver. Mike is, and he gets a regular paycheck which makes regular savings easier. But I am loathsome at it. When we were raising kids,  much of the money I made went to buying clothing, food, and the myriad of other things that come with the schooling years. It always seemed like there was an expense that needed urgent attention in the moment.

LIving simply like this costs much money.

The rule of ‘pay yourself first’ is not that easy for an in-the-moment person like me. I always paid my bills first, took care of kids second, bought supplies for whatever hobby I was focused on third, then if there was something left over…well actually that never happened to be honest. I realize that this is an undisciplined way to live so don’t even bother to tell me. I’m already taking out my hearing aids so I don’t actually even hear you. Now that the kids have been replaced by the boat, it’s still hard.

Beautiful, but costly.

I am always just amazed at how good Mike is at saving money from every paycheck, but to be fair, working for a mindless corporation comes with some benefits such as having automatic withdrawals and deposits. Even to get that kind of convenience, though,  I would never have survived the corporate world because my bullshit detector is always set to ‘stun’.

Well the digital world has finally caught up with people like me. I discovered this fantastic application for my phone: Digit. Their motto is “Save Money, Without Thinking About It”. Are you kidding? Sign me up!  But wait, is it safe? How does this thing work?

Money Money Money!

I explored their website and found that all funds up to $250,000 are FDIC insured. OK, well that’s the same as a big bank so that’s fabulous. I’m unlikely to save that amount without spending some of it anyhow. Also it’s free, which it should be since it’s actually acting as an online bank, which means they are holding my money for me until I want it. They get to use my money just like the banks do. That’s a fair trade for this amount of convenience. You do not earn interest, but when was the last time you really earned interest on a bank account? Who cares?

So how does this work? It’s actually pretty slick. You connect Digit to your checking account and their program analyzes your spending and deposit patterns by checking your account for activity every few days. Then it begins moving small amounts that you will not even miss into your Digit savings account. If that sounds stealthy, well, it is. But the beauty of this is the amount of communication you receive from Digit, and this is what I really love about the usability of this application.

Every single morning I get a text from Digit telling me my checking account balance. I LOVE that. I don’t have to remember to check myself, I don’t have to log in to my account. I just get this nice text. All communication is done via text. When they move money over to my Digit account, I get a text. If I want more information, there are commands I can text back, such as ‘balance’ or ‘recent’ to see recent transactions. No dealing with ‘press 1 for English’, ‘2 for someone from India who says his name is Ken’, ‘0 for us to hang up on you’.

So for instance, last week Digit saved $9.72 for me. That’s not very much, and I didn’t even notice it, which is part of the beauty of this system. They texted me to let me know they had saved money for me, then if I wanted to save more I could text them back and tell Digit how much more I’d like to save.  I can also log onto the website and see a complete history of all transactions. It I want to make a withdrawal, a simple text command is all it takes to transfer money into my checking account.

Lucky bandits. They have access to Digit in their youth!

I’m pretty impressed with this application. Actually, I love it. So far I have saved about $125 that I would definitely not have saved otherwise. I’ve been using it for a little over a month. That’s not very much yet, but it will buy muchos fish tacos down in Mexico.

My only regret is that this is a new thing, and I would love to have had something like this 20 years ago. If you are working on beefing up your sailing kitty and want to try Digit, here’s a link you can use to sign up. If you do sign up, please consider using the link here. Full disclosure: I get 5$ if you use my link. If you sign up, you will get your own link to use with your friends and family. Then you, too, can buy fish tacos.

Check it out!