Being Too Thrifty

Being thrifty has become a way of life for me. Looking through Cold Creek and other high end clothing catalogs gives me ideas of how to put together certain 'looks'. I get caught up in these dreams sometimes, only to discover the assembly of color and style look good only on a slim, trim figure, not my apple-shaped 65-year-old form.

Using and reusing plastic bags were the bane of my husband's dish washing chore. He flatly refused to wash aluminum foil anymore but suffered through all sizes of bags until they would either leak or not close.

His own thriftiness left me with piles of partially used lumber, boxes of electrical wire, plumbing parts, nails, screws, washes, and 'whatzudoozers' that might be used for some kind of project about which I have no idea.

We'd been talking about downsizing. Thank goodness we spent two weeks over two years ago clearing out ¼ of the metal building so the kids could have storage space during a move. Now I have a staging area for more 'stuff' to recycle, sell, or dump.

The reality that I might not need to be as thrifty with food as I have been was brought home recently. I have a habit of using the last dabs of anything to create something else. My kids dubbed my left over casseroles as Earlene's ETEs (Extraterrestrial Experiences). Everyone of them could never be repeated because they were based on the left over portions of what we'd eaten for the preceding three to four days.

I kept this habit long after everyone left home and was continuing it after Y passed away. So many wonderful soups and stews came my way. I couldn't throw out a thing until one day I detected a suspicious smell coming out of one 'reused' bag.

I knew I shouldn't eat it so I took it outside for whatever animal it might serve.

In about 10 minutes, I turned at the sound of heavy wings flapping in the yard.

Three vultures were perched, each on separate metal fence posts, watching a fourth try my concoction. They then vied to be the one to finish the last morsel.

I'll be setting uneaten food out a lot sooner from now on.