On The Mend

The dreaded airline plague has gripped our house for the last few days.  We are always in fear of picking up germs while flying, I worry about it every time hubby has to go somewhere for business.  He has both asthma and allergies so any little bug that latches on to him makes his life miserable.  This time he got it on Tuesday.....gave it to me on Thursday.  I have no asthma nor allergies so my body seems to be able to fight the crap off faster.  We both took an actual sick day (possibly our first ever) yesterday cancelling all appointments and spending the day resting.

This is what $41.91 looks like in Canada

On Tuesday I realized we were running low on supplies and had to fork out $41.91 for cough and flu suppressants.  Usually I keep a good supply but with both of us sick and me refusing to use Buckley's (yuck yuck yuck) there was no option.  I likely could have gotten it cheaper across town but when you are feeling crappy you won't drive across town for stuff like that.  We can afford it....but what about if you can't?  Illness is often a reason people get into debt...anything to feel better.  From here on out I need to be better at having a year supply on hand buying them on sale instead of being held hostage at the pharmacy when we are sick.  We had enough cough drops, tissues, rubs...just were low on the important expensive stuff.  And for those who say we should have gotten the flu shot - hubby did.  It is so bloody hit and miss with vaccinating for the flu.  I do believe in vaccinations but the last time I got a flu shot I was terribly ill.  Since I have a pretty good immune system I did not get one this year.

I truly thought at the end of January I would have several hundred dollars left in the grocery budget of $575 - as hubby was not even in the house 12 nights and me 8 due to being on holidays or away on business.  I failed miserably.  $498.75 of the $575 was spent so only $76.25 under budget.  Part of that was trying to stay on budget in 2018 so I had depleted some of our food and OTC stocks.  About $190 of the money spent was on OTCs and non-food items like toilet paper.  I also stocked up on a lot of canned goods.   Since I am still trying to clear out the freezer to defrost it I have had to bypass a lot of meat sales, so very sad.  But - the light at the end of the tunnel is that the freezer is almost cleared out, I just need to make a big batch of blackberry jam and I should be good to go.  I did buy 4 kilos of skinless boneless chicken breast for $26 on sale but we eat it all the time and it can be repacked into little packages so we do at least have chicken and fish to eat (lots of fish, probably 10 lbs of the salmon caught from last summer plus a bag of Costco Cod).  

When we were in Mexico I wanted to try and find a replacement glass for the set of blue Mexican glasses I bought at a church sale last year for $2.50.  There were only five so I needed one more but failed to measure it before we left.  I bought the glass on the right for 80 pesos or $5.50 CAD - close enough.  No one will be measuring their glasses while on my patio drinking cocktails and if they do then I haven't made them strong enough.  Now I have a set of 6.  I originally bought them to resell but we immediately fell in love with them and use them every day, even more now that we put them in the dishwasher versus hand washing them (I thought they were delicate, I was wrong).  They are virtually indestructible as I have bounced them off our quartz countertop more than once and no chips.

In other news one of my favorite thrift stores burned down while we were on holidays.  At first they thought it was arson, but now it looks like it was accidental.  The thrift store is a nonprofit for Women and children in transition.  The entire town has gotten behind the organization in the last 10 days donating money until they can get the thrift store back up and running.  I have made my first monetary donation of the year to them.  When I find out they are reopening I will have a house purge here as well as at Moms to help them with new stock which they could not insure as it is impossible to insure thrift store stock as it is all donated.

While a large portion of the USA and Canada is in the grip of winter we came back to green grass - but it looks like they are forecasting snow for tomorrow - our second of the year.  So, because I am feeling a little bit better today I am going to go out and run a couple of errands.  It isn't going to get that cold, just below freezing but people here fail to get appropriate tires (because 98% of the time we don't need them) or have no idea how to drive in snow so usually we try and stay at home when it snows.  

If you are in the freezing cold - Spring is coming, I promise!