To live and explore

We went to flea market near Chicago to sell my stockpile. We have been there thrice, “business” was really good and it was quite fun. We left home around 5.30 a.m, reach there 6.45 a.m, setup the “stall” and by 9.30 a.m., we are sold out! After that we closed the stall and locked the van, and went around checking out other stalls.

The flea market is on Sat and Sun in the spring, summer and fall, there are easily about 500 stalls selling all sorts stuffs. They are amateur sellers who sell stuffs they no longer use that dig out from their garage or basement, they are professional flea marketers who sell vegetables, furniture, trinkets, toys, toiletries, ..you name it, someone is selling it!! They are so many stalls selling so called collectibles i.e. old bottles, toys, which to me the uninformed, they are just junks! There are even a couple of stalls selling jewelry and precious stones, but they are probably not certified diamonds! Would you buy diamonds at flea market if they do sell them? I would not!

The van would not start two weeks ago. T didn’t close the door tight and left the light on overnight. thus exhausted the battery. The neighbor’s boyfriend helped me to jump start the car, but it went dead again as it did not recharge enough before I turned off the engine.

T brought it to the workshop to recharge the battery, but was told he has to replace the whole battery. Despite me telling him there was nothing wrong with the battery, T and his dad decided to get it replaced and also “fixed” the alternator. The repair bill came up to be $330++.

The mechanics must have thought they got some dumb big fish, they also “discovered” problems with the shocks and recommended flushing the break fluids. They gave an estimate of repairs, came up to be a few dollars less than $1000!

Though equally ignorant about cars, I knew better not to trust mechanics! I told T no where we are going to spend so much money repairing a car that only cost $3500! So, T talked to his coffee mate, the retired policeman recommended him a mechanic whom he said is honest. T sent the car for him to check the shocks. Guess what? The second mechanic found nothing wrong with the shocks and whatsoever.

Now they have me thinking: we might not even have to replace the battery or alternator! For all you know, all we need is recharging the battery for 5-6 hours!!

I hope T learned the lesson this time. It always pay to compare and double checks because they are so many unscrupulous businesses out there to make a quick buck. I am sure it goes the same for  life insurance rate! We were able to save a lot by comparing the rates before we renew our auto insurance few months ago. It was almost half of what T used to pay, with same coverage and same deductible!!

There is a GREAT promotion going on in Jewel Osco this week. I have been shopping frantically and gotten tons of stuffs for free. Almost everything on the promotion list (which is more than 1000 items) are free or almost after coupons. I have “bought” more than 100 bottles of shampoos/conditioners and tons of deodorant, peanut butter, pasta, laundry detergent, Lipton tea bags and mayonnaise so far. The store is totally running out of the shampoo/conditioner. I placed an order on Sunday but they didn’t show up with the Tuesday’s truck load, so even the warehouse is out of them now!!

They are two brands of ice creams for free this week. I have gotten a0 pints of Fannie May Gourmet ice cream and a couple quart cartons Breyer’s ice cream. No more freezer space for them. Consuming all this free ice cream will certainly have us put on weight. Probably not going to get more even they are free, unless they come with free weight loss pills. Yeah, we need more ice cream as much as we need a hole in our head!

T is going to take time off from work for a week in the middle of August, which is one week away. He wants us to drive up to Wisconsin for a vacation. But, the procrastinator hasn’t made any arrangement or plan yet! I am not going to be stressed about a vacation nor going to do all the planning! I will just go with the flow.

He has never went up to Wisconsin, so he has no idea what kind of attractions or rental place they have up there. I would expect him to do the research on vacation rental for Wisconsin on a site similar to Outer Banks rentals(which is for vacation rental in North Carolina) and make arrangement acordingly instead of picking one last minute without any research. We of course can’t afford an arm or a leg a vacation rental place, we are looking for a cabin near the lake or a rental apartment!

It took me 3 months to learn to play the grocery games really well. Nowadays, we got most of our groceries FREE or close to FREE from Jewel Osco and Target. For toiletries and household items, we got the best deals from Walgreen and Walmart! I cringed everytime I think of we used to pay full price $3.00+ for a tube of toothpaste, now, if it’s not free or moneymaking, I won’t even bother to go in the store!

Since we got the groceries, toiletries and household items covered. Next we need to learn places where we get the best buy for furnitures, electronics and clothings.

Time really flies, it has been almost six months since I moved to IL in the end of September. The weather got cold right after I arrived, though it got warmer two weeks ago, it’s still hovering around 40-50 F ( 5-10 C). I have not started driving yet. T tried to discourage me to drive on snow covered roads, but mostly because I am a procrastinator, I have not gone down to the DMV to take the tests for driver’s license.

Supposed I can drive with my Malaysian driver license for the first six months, but the catch is: I need to be on the auto insurance before I can drive, and T won’t put me on the auto insurance unless I got my  IL driver license. He is supposed to research and find out cheapest auto insurance company to get me on the auto insurance when we renewed the auto insurance last month. It ended up he just renewed the auto insurance with the existing company without adding my name on it!

I have been attending a fortnightly meeting with mostly spouses of foreign students on Friday. We are supposed to tour the YMCA and then proceed to the church to celebrate Sherry’s birthday. But I would have to miss it because a faucet started leaking tonight and I have to wait for the plumber to come to fix it tomorrow morning.

We live in a one hundred years old house, so things are archaic. Few weeks ago, sewage was leaking off the outlet that shared by the washing machine and toilet. Though the landlord fixed it almost immediately, there was quite a mess to clean up! When we first moved in, one of the shower faucets was leaking badly. We told the landlord but he didn’t get back to us. So, we decided to replace it and deducted it from the rental payment. It’s a spacious place with very nice wood frame, but we probably won’t renew the tenancy agreement and will look for a new place when spring comes and will move out late spring or summer.

T has not taken any vacation after working at the same company for one and half years. He has accumulated a few weeks of vacation time! We are talking about taking a one week vacation in the summer. He has submitted the tentative dates to his boss and HR department for approval. But, we have not decided where to go!

We are looking at a place in the Midwest where we can drive without flying. Our initial plan was to drive  up to Galena for a quiet weekend staying at a cabin on the mountain.  But, our restless super hyper big boy thinks one week is too long to stay on the mountain and he is afraid he may die of boredoom!

I think he will probably enjoy the Live Entertainment Capital of the World - Branson, Missouri more than a quiet week on the mountain! I was looking at the vacation packages for Branson. They are certainly a lot of attractions and things to see in Branson. I would not mind visiting the Wax Museum and Ripley’s Believe it or Not, and would certainly enjoy the outdoor activities available. T has given me the green light to make vacation arrangement, I was looking at the lodging options and prices of tickets to shows and attractions. There are also Branson vacation package which are quite reasonably priced. Hmmmm, taking a vacation package will probably save me time and money !

The lease of our current apartment expires in June and we do not plan to extend the lease. We are looking for a new place to move into when summer comes!

I have been looking at classified ads, making calls and T drove me around to look at different subdivisions and the surroundings. Since this is a college town, a lot of rented apartments in one side of the town are  all occupied by students. So, we are trying to find a place on the other side of town.

While I was looking at the ads, I actually learned about names of different towns around here. There is a small town named “Paw Paw”, which is 15 minutes from where we live! I also learned that paw paw is a type of tree. I wonder whether this town is named after the tree, just like my hometown Melaka is named after a Melaka tree!

Many of you know we have just folded up the tutoring business and getting ready to move to IL. Feeling sad to leave some of my students, especially those who have some learning difficulties. We have worked hard to boost their self esteem and got rid of the labels applied on them.

The mother of the boy who is dyslexic and has attention deficit wants me to talk to the new tutor she is going to to hire. But, it’s kind of hard to communicate when she comes from a different paradigm! She is from the old school, if a student doesn’t perform academically, it’s the problem with his IQ. She doesn’t seem to understand when I told her that this boy is very intelligent (yet can have learning difficulties). He is fine if he has individual attention of an one-on-one Tutor who uses multi-sensory approach. In fact, he has progressed leaps and bounds in the last six months, from a non-reader who can’t read “fish”, he can encode and decode multi-syllable word like “establishment”!.