Category: Going for Broke

Last night my camera (an old Olympus C-2100 Ultra-Zoom) went kaput. I suspect there’s a little motor that’s responsible for moving the lenses to adjust focus, and it’s failed… as neither the auto, nor the manual focus work. (Unlike an SLR, the “manual” focus is still electronic – pressing buttons rather than twisting a ring on the lens.)

I mentioned this in a post yesterday, but I wanted to talk about it again because it’s a crushing blow. My camera is like my various writing tools… I don’t put them to as good a use as some, but I enjoy the heck out of using them. A part of me saw the camera breaking as an oportunity. When I bought the camera, it was a bit of a compromise. I truly loved my film cameras before it: a fully manual Pentax, and a Canon EOS. I’m no artist, but I had great fun playing with focus, depth of field and exposure on my film SLRs. Each of these adjustments are either impossible to play with, or so poorly arranged on a point-and-shoot camera that it’s hardly worth bothering. The Olympus was somewhere in between. Using shutter priority or aperture priority mode was easy enough, but going fully manual on exposure was a mess (and “manual” focus was completely impractical, unless you had five minutes to compose your shot… and even I’m not that patient).

But, it was a digital camera, so it had a huge advantage over my film cameras… instant feedback. With my film cameras I never remembered how I took a picture by the time I had it developed, so when they came out bad it was tough to learn from my mistakes. Occasionally I’d take notes as I took pictures, but carrying around a notepad when I was out on a hike was a big pain in the but (and took away from the purpose of the hike: to relax).

I said before that a small part of me saw this as an opportunity, because this is a chance to right a wrong. I could do it right this time and get a nice digital SLR. I’ve read good things about the Pentax Nikon D40 (Macworld thinks highly of it), and I can see myself on a hike with the kids, snapping pictures and sharing them with the kids as we go. (Every time I take a picture the kids always rush over to see how it came out. It’s adorable and makes picture taking an event, not just a throw away moment. Beth has even become quite the critic, commenting on the more technical aspects she likes in a picture. It’s a lot of fun… a hobby I can truly share with the kids.)

But, that old problem rears it’s ugly face again: money. We just got a computer. We just sprung a leak somewhere in the house, and plumbing can get expensive to fix. Under the circumstances, just getting a new camera will be a hard sell to the wife, let alone doubling (or tripling) the cost of a simple point and shoot to spring for a digital SLR.

My consumer sense is tingling again.

It occurs to me that water is somewhat unique, in that gives and sustains life; but also can bring tragedy and death. I don’t want to play up this entry too much. This pales in comparison to the large scale disasters flood waters have brought to many parts of the world. I just seems that I take water for granted… that I only notice it when it’s jumped the tracks, loosed from it’s shackles and running amok.

This morning I saw a little bit of stray water, but it wasn’t the amount that gave me pause… it was it’s location.

I’ve determined that it’s coming from a leaking drain in the bathtub.

So now I’m looking at tearing out the tub, possibly replacing it while it’s out (it’s started to rust), and re-tiling the stall. The only thing I want to do less than tear out a tub and tile the stall, is pay someone else to tear out the tub and tile the stall.

On top of that my trusty digital camera, the one that’s served me faithfully since 2001, suddenly stopped focusing. With a couple kids in the house, I simply CAN NOT go with out a camera for any period of time. But…

On top of that, we’re coming off a kitchen disaster. The other day we discovered that Adam knows how to change the temperature settings on the refrigerator/freezer. We discovered this the hard way, after Adam set them both to “warm,” and learned this is an apt description. Two hundred dollars of groceries got thrown away.

I shouldn’t complain. Cheryl and I make enough money to live, and I try to keep my needs and wants modest. Yet this has been one of those weeks when I wished I made a little bit more money.

Everyone says I should indulge myself while I’m in the hospital. If only they knew. Armed with a credit card number and a wi-fi connection I’ve been a shareware paying, upgrade buying, web host upgrading mad spender.

And the madness doesn’t end there. In between bouts of fever, chills, and pain I could be resting up. Instead I’ve undertaken a huge project to reorganize my genealogy data, and a slightly smaller project to reconfigure the html files over at mykauffman.com for a new server.

I probably could have just changed a server setting instead, but what fun is that?

Thats right friends, no play on words is to lame; we’re officially poor. Late last week we employed a classic strategy for budget busting known as “roofing.” Any time you employ someone to perform strenuous labor in uncomfortable circumstances AND you involve a primary component of the structure of your house… you’re likely to end up hosed. What’s more, like the garden variety, there are several ways you can take your hosing… the traditional “soaking” method or the lashing technique are but two examples. Either way your bound to feel ill afterwards.

I don’t know about you, but I’m about to throw my hose away. Not only is it harbinger of memories best forgotten, but everywhere it goes growing grass follows. Frankly, I’m surprised we’ve kept it around this long. I really hate to mow the grass.

On a high note: I took in a most excellent hockey game Saturday night. Had it come later in the season, with graver consequences hanging in the balance, it might have been the best live hockey experience of my sheltered existence. And on a relieved note, we made a nice trip to see Cheryl’s family in Orlando. As astute readers can attest, I don’t normally relish an opportunity to see our old home town, but Sunday’s road trip wasn’t bad at all. It may not sound like much, but there’s nothing wrong with a weekend that’s not bad.

**Author’s note: this entry was submitted in it’s entirety without proofing or editing of any kind. Just for kicks, I turned off the spell check too. (Boy we’re really having fun now!)

I’ve come to the point in my week when our stores of name-brand products have run dry. I’m almost exclusively down to the generic alternatives I bought on Friday, following my most recent fiscal epiphany. First let me say that anyone who claims generic tastes the same as brand either never tried both, is lying, or is incapable of picking sugar out of a line-up of artificial sweeteners. The difference in taste is inescapable… to my persnickety palate anyway. However, that’s not really the point, is it? Just because something tastes different doesn’t mean it’s better or worse, and this is the crux of the issue. Has switching to generic brand foods affected my quality of life?

I’m not sure yet; and therein lies the rub on this entry… its not really much of an update if I don’t have anything new to say, is it?

I’ve got great news! I just saved a bunch of money on my grocery bill!

I used to be a grocery snob. You know the type, those people who fall for the raz-mataz of a “name brand.” I’d go grocery shopping and look down my long, anglo-germanic nose at “those people” with the store labels in their cart. Well a funny thing happened on my way to insolvency… I decided to try and save a little money.

There are several ways to solve a budget problem:
1. increase income;
2. decrease expenses; or,
3. die.

I’m a happy-go-lucky civil servant, so that rules out two options…

So I decided to take a looksie and see where my budget could stand some shaving. As it turns out groceries are one of our biggest monthly expenses; and somewhere between gluttony and malnutrition there’s some wiggle room. So I went to the store this afternoon and set aside my petty bias and had my self a generic brand ho-down. It wasn’t until I was checking out that I noticed that my cart looked like something out of science fiction. Where else do you see a collection of different kinds of food in nearly identical packaging and labeling. All I could think of were those scenes from Lost where they discover caches of Dharma Initiative food stuff, with the identical, generic black and white labels. So far so good though, I did save some money.

Now we just have to see if the stuff is edible.

… a dead one, as it turns out. Perhaps this was a little heavenly payback for mocking a well-meaning gift giver.

Let me explain…
It all started in Adam’s bedroom. It smelled bad, but that’s not completely unexpected considering Adam is only one year old. All manner of smelly stuff “happens” in there, so the smell was kind of ignored for a couple of days. Well not exactly ignored… the nose can be a powerful and constant reminder, but let’s just say that a bad smell in Adam’s room fit perfectly with my world view. On day three the bouquet started to take on a hint of decay. That’s when I decided to look into modes of exterior entry for our attic – and found one near Adam’s room. A quick trip to the far corners of our attic produced a much more powerful olfactory response, but no source.

That’s when we called our exterminator.

We set an appointment for the next day, and arranged for Cheryl’s father to be present to let him in.

Fast forward to yesterday evening. I got a call from Cheryl’s mother, saying the exterminator came and couldn’t find the smell. “Did he go up in the attic?” I asked. “Yes, but he didn’t smell anything.” It was fate that put me on the road to my allergist at that moment, right at the intersection where I would normally turn off to go home. Faster than you can say, “stall him,” I was homeward bound.

Exterminator: “Well sir, I went up in your attic and I couldn’t smell anything, certainly nothing compared to the smell in your son’s room. That’s why I think it must have fallen into one of the walls. The smell is obviously lower, not higher, so it can’t be in your attic. If it’s in your walls then we won’t be able to help you.”

Me: “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be argumentative, but that doesn’t fit with my experience yesterday evening. The smell was much worse in the attic that in my son’s room. If I go up there this evening, after you’ve left, and it’s not how you’ve just described it I’m going to be REALLY upset.”

Exterminator: “Well I’ll go up there with you right now if you want.”

Me: “Sure, let’s go.”

Exterminator (surprised and disappointed, heads over to the attic access door and opens it up): “You see, if there was a dead animal in your attic you’d be overcome with the odor as soon as I opened the door. I don’t smell anything right now.”

Me (after we’ve crawled up into the attic and positioned ourselves over Adam’s room): “This is where I smelled it. Can you smell it?”

Exterminator: “Here it is right here.”

Me (close to producing more fuel for the olfactory fire): “Sorry, I’ve gotta go.”

Believe it or not, I try not to be smug; but when someone basically calls me a liar I’ve got to say something. I wonder if the guy even went up in the attic before I got there. My guess is he stuck his nose up through the door and called it a day. I almost felt bad for the guy when he found the dead animal, despite his earlier assertions. If I really thought he’d done his job before I goaded him into doing it, I would.

Here’s the one thing that gives me pause… as it turns out I was probably standing over the darn thing the night before… and I didn’t find it either. It’s a lot easier to feel superior when you’re not just as inept as the next guy. What’s even worse is that I have to relearn this lesson over and over again.

It turns out perspective and ego can be a perilous combination.