Thursday, Hot, Thrifty Thursday, Fires crews

  115 here yesterday so a little cooler.  We had thunder storms last night, and lightning, but have not heard about any fires yet.  We also got a little rain so we are only expecting 104 today! Only...

My flowers are suffering and our corn in the garden is burning.  We are even having yellow leaf drop off on our squash.  They just cannot bear this heat. We can water and water and it does no good. But it is cool in the house and for that I am grateful.

Hubs hooked up the outside two burner stove, and we boiled potatoes and hard boiled eggs, for potato salad, last night and he also fried a couple of steaks outside on the stove.  So we are not using our stove to stress the power grid and to heat up the house making our air conditioner work harder. They have especially stressed not using a lot of power at dinner time as this is when the most consumption comes in here.

 

Last night we went out to get a soda and I had hubs stop at a house that had a huge apricot tree with over hanging branches into the rode.  If the apricots were ripe I was going to stop and ask if I could pick some to make jam,  Apricot jam is my favorite.  Anyway he walks up to the fence and dogs start barking and all of a sudden 5 heads pop up out of a pool on their property.  They were staring at hubs like he was a burglar.  HE was so embarrassed that he turned around and ran for the car, making him look even more suspicious.  Then he told me next time I had a stupid, embarrassing idea, to do it myself.  We stopped on the way back home to explain ourselves and the people were not home, to which hubs declared they were probably out buying a home security system.  But I did stop by today and explained myself and yes we can have all the apricots we want.

I did get three bridesmaid dresses done yesterday, and a wedding dress ripped but did not get to the missionary pants so those are first on the list for today.  Then I simply have to do at least two more wedding dresses.  I just want everything for the 10th out or at least done before the weekend.

Thrifty Thursday:

1. saved all my spare change in my pig bank

2. saved a $1,$5,$10,$20 bill

3. saved money in two of my one hundred envelope challenge

4. saved all my $5.00 bills, now $1380.00

5. if you are doing the penny a day challenge you need to add $61.07 to your penny bank.

6. only found .26 cents this week, but I have not been out due to the heat.

7. Ate all meals at home except one and then used a gift card.

8. used foods from storage and pantry and freezers to cook meals

9. Hubs went to wash the car and the car wash was under repair, he was asked to come back as they had to test it and he got a free car wash.  Saving $8.00

10.used coupons at Joanns for supplies

11.ate squash and onions and a few beans out of the garden

12. any food scraps given to chickens

13. Won, $28.26 in a class action suit from Spokane on their illegal traffic light system.  I wonder how much the attorneys got? 

14.The littles parents, and our kids both brought us free diet cokes from Mc'ds.  Hey free diet coke I am all in!

15.found a great buy on beef and stocked up

16. used coupons to finally buy some loss leaders at the grocery store.  Buns for this weekend.

FIRE CREW BOSS:

Hubs was a fire crew boss for years.  One of his funniest stories or maybe not so funny but unusual was when he had a prison crew on a fire somewhere here in Idaho.I don't remember when or where and neither does he, just the incident. 

Prison crews consist of 18 prisoners and one guard and Hubs. These are low security non violent men who are close to getting paroled.  It is a privilege to be on a fire crew.  You get to get outside, you get better food, you get paid a small wage to use at the commissary, You are relatively free  and with others that appreciate you.

They had been out for at least two weeks, when some of the crew stated to complain of sore throats.  Well breathing in smoke all day will make you hoarse and give you a sore throat, but by evening even hubs had to admit his throat was more than sore. It was common to share drinking canteens with one another.  IF you ran out your buddy would allow you to drink from his. By the next morning all but 2 prisoners and the guard were very sick.  They were bused into a small town and put up at a ma/pa hotel, where a country doctor that took care of the area came out and they all had strep.  So everyone was given a shot in the butt with penicillin, even the ones that were not sick.  They had to stay at the hotel for 3 days so as to not infect other crews.  Then it was back on the line for every one.  The prisoners loved it, especially the ones that were not sick.  Air conditioned rooms, tv with channels, food brought from the only local ma/pa restaurant where they ordered what they wanted from the menu.  The sick ones just slept.  By the way this would never happen today. Too many laws governing fire fighters and hours.

Food poisoning was common among fire crews.  Sack lunches allowed to sit in hot conditions often led to rampant illness.  Hubs was with a prison crew fighting along the Salmon river gorge in Idaho when sub sandwiches were delivered to his crew.  Everyone ate and with in a couple of hours all were vomiting, and running for the trees.Now prisoners are not allowed outside of the the guards presence, and even the guard was in bad shape.  Soon they were out of toilet paper, everyone was running fever and chills. Both hubs, and the guard were beside themselves.  Who wants to be out in the wilderness with 18 sick prisoners armed with machetes,and chain saws?  It became obvious that this was going to be a long drawn out suffering incident especially, when the flies started to gather.  I don't want to go into too much detail, but it was a stinky awful mess.  Hubs radioed in and they all left their gear in a pile and hiked,stumbled, slid down the steep, rocky slope into the river, where they sat fully clothed until helicopters, pulled them out. Then it was 48 hours to recover.

More tomorrow.

HAVE A GREAT AND PRODUCTIVE DAY STAYING POSITIVE WHILE YOU ARE IN THE NEGATIVE. My capitol key keeps sticking grrrrr.

Kim