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Money-Saving Tip: Put Your Groceries Away

23 Hour Smoked Boston Butt — Image by bbum via Flickr

Last night, we went grocery shopping. I found a beautiful pork roast, just begging to come home with me. It could spend all day Sunday in the smoker. Rub some brown sugar and garlic on the outside, maybe use a mix of maple and cherry wood chips to turn my pork butt into breakfast food. Picture this: a beautiful chunk of slow-cooked pork butt, covered in a candied crust, falling apart at the lightest touch, and tasting faintly of maple syrup.

It was love.

This morning, I woke up, walked into the kitchen to make some breakfast, and saw that beautiful butt sitting on the counter. Room temperature meat, ruined by my negligence. $15 in the trash.

We got back late last night, and apparently set this wonderful piece of future-food down with the non-refrigerated items were were planning to put away later. We said good-bye to the sitter, chased the kids to bed, picked up the house a bit, and forgot about my new love.

I’m sad.

Here’s my advice: When you get home from grocery shopping, immediately put all of the groceries away. Let the kids juggle knives for a bit, if you have to, but get the food put away. If that’s not going to work, at least take it all out of the shopping bags so you can check your work.

There are starving kids in Iowa. Don’t let potential candied pork roast go to waste.

Playing For Blood

Parenting

Toys of Christmas Past — Image by brizzle born and bred via Flickr

Kris at Every Tips and Thoughts wrote a post about games and ~~letting her kids win~~ feeling bad about winning. I disagree. This post is an expansion of my comment there.

When we play games in my house, we play for blood. I’ve never let my kids win and they know it. From the first time the kids attempt Memory, they know they’ve got to earn a win against Mom and Dad. They know if they lose, they must do so gracefully. If they pout or cry, they lose game privileges for a while. I demand good sportsmanship, win or lose.

To be clear, my kids are 3, 4, and 11 and they are all held to the same standards of sportsmanship. Win or lose, they will do so gracefully. There will be no temper tantrums when they are Sorry’d and no pouting when the Queen is captured.

It took my son almost 3 years to beat me at chess. When it finally happened, he was almost as proud as I was and still talks about it 5 years later.

It’s not much fun playing games with his friends. They were coddled and expect to win everything. I have to take away game privileges just like I do for my 3 year old. They hate that because we have the coolest board games. Nobody else has games that involve zombies or disembodied brains.

What has the result been?

My kids love playing games. This week, my oldest has been teaching his sisters how to play Life. When he visits his friends, he’s as likely to bring a board game as an electronic game. He’s got a good mind for strategy, and I can’t remember the last time he pouted when I tromped him.

My 4 year old hasn’t mastered gamesmanship yet, but she will. When I threaten to put the game away, she wipes her eyes, and keeps playing, even if her jaw is chattering. She knows what is expected and works to live up to it.

Both of the older kids are competitive. They’ve never had a win handed to them, and they have each had wins they had to work for, and they know how it feels to win and earn it.

The youngest doesn’t care if she wins, she’s just happy to play. In my experience, the competitive gameplay gene doesn’t activate until 4.

In my mind, the real world won’t hand them any wins, so I might as well start teaching them how to work for it now.

How about you? Do you let your kids win, or do you teach them that all games are bloodsports?

Time Management

Finance, Relationships

My wife told me that I don’t do enough around the house.

She is, of course, correct.

I could make a list of excuses, but none of them matter. There’s really only one reason: I have problems with time management. I’m easily distracted.

For example, in the time it’s taken me to write the above three lines, I stopped to check a website, updated my Evernote installation, and added a new contact to my address book.

That’s not multi-tasking, that’s inefficiency. People don’t actually multi-task. Instead, they break concentration and completely switch gears. Repeatedly. They pretend they are doing a lot of things at once, when in fact they are doing a large series of individual tasks. That’s serial single-tasking, poorly.

On top of that, I focus to the point of obsession. The entire world goes away when I am working.

No, that’s not a contradiction. I’m good at procrastinating and I am interested in everything. If a random thought floats to the surface while I’m working, I follow it to Google and, if it’s interesting enough, I get lost. It generally only happens during research or while doing a job I hate.

For those of you following along at home, I can be easily distracted from some tasks, then lock on to some tangent and have an evening disappear.

For some reason, my wife hates that, especially when there are dishes to be done and laundry to be folded.

This has blown up on me a few time.

We’ve come upon a solution, in three parts.

1. Timer. When I get on the computer, I set an egg timer for 1 hour. When the time’s up, I’m done. The time limit helps me focus on finishing the task at hand. If I know I need to get a post written in an hour, I’m less likely to catch up on the comics in my news reader.

2. Communication. If I’m working on something that I know will take more than an hour, I tell her. I’ve had to do that for each installment of the Make Extra Money series.

3. Nagging. If #1 has failed and #2 doesn’t apply, I’ve given my wife explicit permission to remind me, as often as necessary. Sometimes, I don’t register everything people say when I am “lost”, so now she knows to keep trying if I don’t respond, or respond with a spaced-out “Uh-huh, yes, dear.” Before, she was worried about upsetting me by nagging, but I wouldn’t have noticed the first few times. Thankfully, with #1 and #2, #3 has only been an issue one.

Time limits, communication, and persistent reminders. That’s my plan to manage my time. Getting off of the computer has helped me be more useful with household chores and it’s given me a chance to be closer to the woman I love most. The time-limited focus has even helped me get a couple of projects rolling.

We all have the same 24 hours. Are you using yours efficiently?

(P.S. Happy anniversary, honey. These have been the best years I could ask for.)

Christmas Magic

Parenting

When I was little, the world was amazing. The first snowfall was among the best days of the year. Everything was worth exploring, in hopes of discovering something new and fascinating, and everything was fascinating.

Stepping on a crack had serious implications. The wishbone in a turkey earned its name. Blowing out all of the candles on a birthday cake could change your life. The idea of some dude half a world away, watching you, then sneaking into your house to dish our rewards and punishments wasn’t pervy and sick, it was wonderful.

Then, one day, it all changes.

Somebody–a classmate, a older brother, a neighbor–let’s it slip that Santa isn’t real, and the implications snowball. That day, the magic dies.

Wishing on a star? Over.

The Easter Bunny? Hasenpfeffer.

Growing up to be Superman? Welcome to the rat race.

It’s a sad day when kids stop believing in magic.

I don’t believe in lying to my children, but I also don’t believe in destroying their magic. It’s a balancing act.

When my son was 6, an older boy at daycare tried to kill Santa for him. He was upset.

“Dad, is Santa real?”

“What do you think?”

“I don’t believe in Santa.”

“Okay, I’ll let him know.”

“Nonononononono! Don’t tell him!”

Was it lying? Probably, but he obviously wasn’t ready to stop believing, so I let him continue. A year later, we had the same conversation, but the results were quite different.

“Dad, you’ve always said that you hate lying, so why did you let me believe in Santa?”

So I told him the truth. Magic is a frail thing that’s nearly impossible to reclaim and I wanted him to have that treasure for as long as possible. And, “Now that you know, you are in on the conspiracy. You’ve been drafted. Don’t kill the magic for anyone else.”

It was weird having him help me stuff stockings.

If you’ve got kids(and celebrate Christmas), how do you handle the Santa problem?

How You’re Finding Me

Misc

Every once in a while, I like to dig through Google Analytics and see how people are finding this site. Some of the search terms are interesting.

“father of three” mid life crisis

Here’s a free piece of advice. As a father of three, you don’t get to have a mid-life crisis. It’s not allowed. Rather, it’s allowed, but you aren’t allowed to act on it. At a minimum, until your children are out of the house, you need to man up and provide all of the support you possibly can. No sports cars you can’t afford and no 22 year old hardbodies. Be there for your kids.

“payday loans” which accepts guest posts

Payday loan marketing. Just go away. You aren’t running a guest post here.

“slow carb” hungry all the time

You’re doing it wrong. If you are hungry, eat more bacon. Or beans. Beans fill you up longer.

$1000000 business idea

Ideas are the easy part. Execution makes you a millionaire.

articles on why appearance shouldn’t matter?

Appearances do matter, and always will. Your appearance is what makes the initial impression when you meet someone new. You don’t have to be a model, but basic grooming and fashion sense is necessary. Take this with a grain of salt. I’ve got a week’s growth of a beard and I wear a different plaid, button-down shirt every day.

are push ups supposed to be hard

Only the first 50. After that, I kind of go on blissed-out autopilot. If you can do 100 pushups, you can probably do 200.

acceptable place to put tattoo

If you wear clothes there, you can put a tattoo there. Visible tattoos are called “job stoppers” for a reason. If you put a tattoo on your face, the only job you qualify for is “drug dealer’s girlfriend”. Or possibly prison janitor.

burning bridges with toxic people

If you must burn bridges, filling them with toxic people first isn’t a bad idea.

candied pork butt

Rule 34: If it exists, there is porn of it. Interesting side story: while double-checking the rule number, I stumbled across My Little Ponies doing things they never advertise on the box.

cut my wife’s hair

I did this once. Pro tip: In the back, at the bottom, cut small chunks and leave them longer than you think they should be. You can always cut more, but uncutting hair is really hard.

f***** on the roadside by your mechanic

He probably deserves a tip for that.

girls fart for money and girls live farts

See the bit about the pork butt, remove the funny, and…ewww.

how to be a successful debtor

I recommend starting by paying your bills. When the debts are gone, you win. Success!

i ate bacon on slow carb diet

So did everyone else, sweetie. It’s the biggest draw to the slow carb diet.

in memory of pets tattoos

When I get a pet, I get it with the understanding that I’m going to outlive it. The day I bring it home, some small part of me is preparing for the day when I have to dig a hole in my backyard. Tattooing that day? Not gonna happen.

thickening felt behind testicle

Why are you on google? Go to the doctor. Please?

Interesting. Between girls farting and my post about being well-trained, there is a significant amount of fetish traffic coming through here. Maybe I need to explore a new advertising strategy.

Changing Our Situation

Finance

In September 2005, I bought my car, a Chrysler Pacifica. I got it on a loan. Two months later–seven years ago this month–I was told I’d be laid off at the end of the year.

Two weeks ago, we bought a Chevy Tahoe with a loan. Last Monday, my wife was permanently laid off after 12 years with her company. She was told that, if her department opened back up, she’d be welcome to reapply for her job and start as a new employee.

Car loans mean layoffs at my house.

Last Tuesday, I got a formal offer for a new job. I accepted.

I am now a full month away from knowing exactly what my semi-monthly paychecks will be. My wife is getting her final paycheck later this week, which will include a week of severance pay.

For the first time in a number of years, I don’t know what my income looks like. I don’t have a clear long-term picture or a good short-term picture.

I’m not worried.

For the first time in my life, I’m not living paycheck-to-paycheck. Having a couple of pay periods act wonky isn’t going to hurt. Yes, we are going to cut back, but we can manage for a few months without worry. We aren’t going to sweat over putting food on the table.

That is an incredible feeling.

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