Slow and Easy

I'm taking a slow-and-easy approach to life lately. At least I'm trying. It doesn't come naturally to me.

What I want to do is make elaborate plans to lose 100 pounds, pay off $10,000 in credit card debt, and write the Great American Novel by my birthday. I do this to myself every. single. year. And guess what? Nothing gets done. Worse, a little gets done, but when I burn out it gets undone and then some. So I have more than 100 pounds to lose, and I've used my credit cards because I sent too much of my cash to pay off debt so I'm $11,000 in debt by my birthday. Oh yeah, and I have three pages of 92 different novels stored in my hard drive.

Slow and easy. That's my motto. Kevin and I figured out the other day that if we just pay the minimums on our credit cards, plus $50 a week as a booster, and roll over the paid-off cards amount to the next card, we can be totally out of debt (including our car and doctors bills) in four years. Easy. It isn't some spectacular plan, but it is workable. We easily spend $50 on fast food a week (nice way to pick away at those 100 pounds, huh? Send the McDonald's money to the Visa card.) It won't hurt. It won't make anyone anxious or induce spending binges. Just...Kevin deposits his tokes on Saturday night, comes home and pays the Target bill $50. Easy peasy.

We're supposed to get our stimulus check on Monday, right? Kevin has a low last two digits of his social security. Our plan is to catch up on some bills, put a little in savings, and stock up on groceries.

I'm way freaked out by the world food situation. It's so easy not to see it when you're doing it day after day after day. But I went to Las Vegas last weekend and went to Sunflower Market. A year ago I could buy organic unbleached flour there for 69 cents a pound. Last weekend it was 1.49 a pound. A year ago I could buy Couscous for 89 cents a pound. Last weekend it was 2.49 a pound. Holy shit. The price of Couscous has more than doubled? Yikes.

I've been trying to think of what we could have stored that would make a real food crisis more easily handled. Here's what I've come up with:

Rice
Flour
Potatoes (They'll last a good long time in my unheated laundry room)
Apples (see above)
Beans
Sugar
Canned shortening (yuck...but it doesn't spoil)
Salt
Honey
Dried fruits
Canned vegetables and beans
Powdered milk
Canned meats
Baking mix
Pancake mix (just add water)
Pasta and pasta sauce (the cheap stuff)
Macaroni and cheese (the cheap stuff, again)
Peanut butter
Oatmeal
Canned and powdered soups

So some of our stimulus money is going to stock up on these things that we can rotate into our everyday meals, but that will last a while and will make me feel less like we're on the brink of disaster.