Sunday, November 02, 2014

Fall 2014 November 2 Sunday (DST ends, peanut butter, books)



Daylight Savings Time ends.  Of course, woke up on “real” time, so I got up an hour early, fully awake.  Too early to walk.  49 degrees but with a 22 mph wind it feels like 41 degrees! 

The “fall back” Sunday is always a strange day.  I can feel the extra hour all day.  

Cool weather is definitely here!  Saturday was a good day overall.  I got some stuff thrown out/put in the donation box.  It is a long process, as slowly but surely I try to use the “toothbrush test (Do I use it at least once or twice a day, and/or if  it won’t enhance my life, it goes!).  

I really need to start taking pictures of my “event” t-shirts and hats and donating them.  It is hard to part with them, but I think the picture album will help me donate them.  

Finished the book on “peanut butter”.  I enjoyed it, a little dry at places, but it had a lot of interesting information.   

I hadn’t realized that peanut butter is used a a food for poverty areas (a product called “Plumply Nut”  (and similar names) which is a oatty of 3 oz of  peanut butter, honey and vitamins and is a major source of protein.   

In some cases where children got this the survival  rate even from severe starvation was over 95%, much more than other means of treatment.   

The patty can last for 2 years, unrefrigerated, so it is perfect as a temporary survival food.  

I wrote the book down in my “books read” note book.  I realized I have been keeping track of every book I read in the book for the past 25 years.  (It is a calendar type book, with the days, but not the years, called the “Days of the Literary Year”.  

I need to decide whether to retire the book and start a new one.  Twenty five year is a long time and it may be time to retire it and start a new listing.  

I keep thinking I will put all the books on the computer, but somehow I have never gotten it done.  Maybe a need to do each day as it happens, and at least in a year I will have it done, assuming I actually do it for a year!

It is strange, all that time I had when i wasn’t working and it didn’t really seem I had much time.  I think looking for a job and adjusting to reality (plus moving when we realized we were moving someplace) made a difference.  

I had the same general feeling I had when I was working.  There was SOMETHING I needed to be doing, either researching for jobs, writing and revising my resume, or improving my skills in some way.

Now, since I started my current job, when I am “off” I am truly off.  Not that I don’t work a little bit, especially since I still have a lot to learn, but I don’t feel the need to be doing something all the time.  Of course with still trying to downsize and donate or toss items, I always have something to do.   

Getting ride of “stuff” is getting harder now, of course.  I am getting into items I have had for years,literally my entire  life.  

However, I am taking the attitude that I shouldn’t be owned by my possessions  So what if something “might” be “worth” something  It is is, I’ll sell it!  Even if something is “worth something” , is it really worth carting it around, when the “worth something, even if it is originally a freebee now worth $10 or evenn $50, is it really worth it and, in most cases, it is just old junk that isn’t worth anything anyway.

Certainly a $100 printer we bought 10 years ago that “may” work,isn’t worth while keeping.  A new, more modern printer isn’t much more or even cheaper.

The big problem is probably personal keepsakes that AREN’T worth anything, but have a sentimental   value. Old letters, my dad’s old (and I mean oldI) briefcase thats worn out etc.  There I try to think, is it worth anything to anyone  else?  If not, I try (and I mean try) to toss it.



That’s it for today, Sunday, November 2, 2014     

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