Because I Said So

Bottoms from the Top, Tops from the Bottom

Our basement project continues, and we are without a clothes dryer. The vent had to be disconnected, and -- not wanting to risk carbon monoxide poisoning -- we have been air drying our clothes. I did some searching online for an affordable, portable clothes line and found nothing decent under $150. I could buy a permanent clothes line for far less, the kind that requires sinking into concrete or some other, more permanent installation (for which we have neither the time nor the inclination). So, off to Target for some relatively inexpensive racks.

Hanging clothes out (shaking out the wrinkles, attaching the clothes to the line with wooden pins, taking the dry and fragrant clothes down before the evening dew) reminds me of childhood. My mother and grandmother always hung their clothes out in the summer. I remember running between the sheets in our backyard, between the two, crucifix-like poles. (Once, during a game of ditch, one of the neighbor kids climbed up the pole and sprung upon me as I raced by. In the shadowy half-dark, his oversized t-shirt billowing behind him, he looked like a vampire.)

I like the smell of air-dried clothes, and truthfully it hasn't been as big a pain in the ass as I thought it would be. In fact, it's one of the ways to save energy that many "green" sites and organizations recommend. What surprised me, during my search for clothes lines online, is that there is a small controversy about hanging your clothes out. In fact, it is forbidden in some newer housing and townhome developments, as well as in entire municipalities. Why? Mostly, it's aesthetics: it (supposedly) looks "low-rent."

Are people growing less and less tolerant of one another, or am I just getting cranky in my dotage?

The article is from several years ago, but the same arguments are still being made in current discussions around the web. And I can't just pass it off on those goofy Californians, because even those rational, Labatt-drinking, Coffee Crisp-eating, Gordon Lightfoot-loving Canadians are in on it.

The Rolltop Desk and the One-Eyed Man

One of my newest compulsions is cruising the listings on craigslist.org. No, not the personals -- the furniture listings. It's like a 24-hour garage sale! There are deals to be had, people. And baby you know how I like a deal.

I've always wanted a rolltop desk. All the little cubbies and shelves and slots appeal to the German in me -- all that storage! so tidy! So a couple weeks ago I see a listing for a rolltop desk on craigslist for $45. Yep, $45. Naturally, it's not a really nice rolltop -- it's scratched -- it's not solid wood but has some veneers, etc. Still, $45! And I can paint it and fix it up. I contact the owner and the deal is made.

I head east -- way, way east -- any further east and I'd be in Wisconsin -- and find the owner's apartment. I walk down the dark, dark, dark hallway. I knock. Inside a dog barks, a snarling, angry bark. A man shoos away the dog and opens the door. Big man, tall and heavy, bearded, smelling of cigarette smoke, with a black leather eye patch over his left eye.

By this time I'm feeling a bit nervous. Here I am, alone, in an unfamiliar neighborhood,  meeting a complete stranger who bears no small resemblance to Leonard Smalls, the biker from hell, in "Raising Arizona."

What if the craigslist posting was just a ruse?

How many women before me have been lured to this seedy lair with the promise of inexpensive (nay, cheap) rolltop desks?

Of course, dear readers, all was fine. It couldn't have ended badly or I wouldn't be here blogging, now would I? (This reminds me of watching Star Trek with my sister when we were kids. Me: They can't kill Captain Kirk! The show would be over! My sister: Shut up!)

Really, the most horrifying aspect of this transaction was just getting the desk into my car. After several attempts of Mr. Small's ideas, I finally understood that I would have to be the engineer in this situation. The guy's only got one eye! He probably has less spatial ability than I do!

In the end, we made it work. As I drove away, Mr. Smalls patted the back of my wagon (not a euphemism) and shouted, "It took awhile to load the buggy, but we're headin' to California!" He was a nice guy, actually.

Thus began the next harrowing episode of The Case of the Rolltop Desk. Namely, ten days of priming, and painting, and repainting, and wrecking it, and starting over, and priming, and painting, and painting, and painting, etc. End result: a decent-enough desk, not perfect by any means, but quite nice. I'm calling it my Blanche DuBois desk: in dim light, it looks very good. In bright light..well...it only cost $45.

Delicious Dress

Another Tuesday, another day off, a little more work put into my new wardrobe scheme. As I walk through the aisles of the Goodwill, I hear the voices of Clinton and Stacy guiding me. Or rather I guide them, because neither of them seems like they've spent much time in the Goodwill. (At least not lately.) And they have no idea of the deals one can find there -- no idea!

Today, for instance, I snagged one of the items on my "needs" list: a dress. It's a very plain, charcoal-gray, short-sleeved shirt dress by Liz Claiborne that -- in the parlance of fashion -- can be dressed up or down. It is knee-length and fits me well and will look smashing with my black boots. Do you want to know what I paid for it? Are you ready? Clinton? Stacy? Are you listening? I paid...

$1.28

YES. That is no decimal point error. I actually paid one dollar and twenty-eight cents in U.S. currency for this dress. Blue tags were on sale!

Ah, the exhilaration of a true bargain! There is nothing quite like it. And in my new-found discipline of only buying what I need, it is even better than it was before.  It is like a tasty little morsel of a very rich food, just enough to sate -- but not enough to surfeit -- the appetite.

Yum.

Frugality, My Way

Here I am at my old haunt near St. Paul, the Ramsey County Library Dunn Brothers Coffee Shop (RCLDBCS). This used to be "my library" before we moved. Years ago I read that 90% of the library's resources are used by 10% of the users, and I was definitely one of the top ten. Now I've switched counties but not habits, and I usually have 35 or so materials checked out: CDs, DVDs, and -- of course -- books. Our local library in Smallville is, however, about the size of this coffee shop. Hence, I order most everything I check out from the larger, better-stocked branches. Still, it's my library and I love it.

I LOVE IT. I love the library! One reason: I can feed my compulsive hoarding habit and it doesn't cost a thing. (Except late fines, which really don't count.) I don't have to take "just one" -- I can take as many books as I'd like. And I like to take lots. Do I read them? Silly, silly reader! Of course I read them. Most of them. Some of them. A few. Depending. But it doesn't matter, because it's free and I can just bring them back!

 I love the library!

But, in this arena in my life as in many others, I am attempting to practice restraint and practicality. Frugality, of a kind. The take-just-what-you-need kind, not the make-a-bolster-out-of-a-2-liter-pop-bottle kind. The less-is-more kind, not the cook-things-in-a-box-full-of-hay kind.

Example: I went second-hand shopping this morning, and I had a list of things I needed. And I only bought what I was looking for. And I only bought clothes that I thought I would actually wear, and not ones that would sit in my closet with the price still stapled to the sleeve, until I finally faced up to my error and re-donated said items. I practiced a kind of catch-and-release philosophy with my wardrobe. But no more.

Same goes with the kitchen. Last night I threw away many, many pounds of old, dried beans that were using up valuable shelf space. I like beans, I guess. But I can't ever stir up much enthusiasm for them, much as I would like to. There's a part of me that would love to be one of those granola women who are always shopping at the co-op and making their own hair conditioner out of ripe bananas and wearing organic cotton and soaking beans over night on the counter top.

But it's time for me to face the fact that I am not like that and will not ever be like that, and I don't like brown rice, or whole wheat pasta, either, so there! What was salvageable is going to a food shelf. The rest is going back to the environment, where it will be composted and used to grow delicious, life-sustaining foods that a girl can really sink her teeth into, like patty melts or buffalo chicken wings.

The new, frugal me: pared down to the absolute essentials, with only 30 items checked out on my library card, and clothes that fit me, and a bean-free kitchen.