thurisazsalail:

gallusrostromegalus:

poplitealqueen:

lynati:

replicated:

replicated:

Experiencing brutal cold for a period of time every year keeps you humble

That’s why Californians are like that

Time to plastic over the windows for the season.

????? Why??????????

You put the plastic on the windows to stop the heat from leaking out of your house from between the panes, through the glass itself, and where the window is attatched to the rest of the house.  This does make a drastic difference in the temeprature of your house and the amount of gas/electricity needed to keep it warm.

Some other Winter Things:

• If you think there’s going to be an exceptionally deep freeze, you open up all the cabinets in the house to warm the air in there and keep the pipes from freezing/bursting.
• If you’re going to be away for a while in winter, it’s adviseable to turn your water off to avoid the same.
• Putting an electric Blanket between your topcover and bedsheet and pre-heating your bed for half an hour so you don’t get a chill going to bed.
• Applying literal vasaline to your lips if you’re going to be in the cold for an extended time (more than 10-20 min, depending on latitude), becuase chapstick won’t cut it and your lips will split and bleed and HURT
• Doing the same to your nose
• Your tears go from liquid to gooey trying to produce a similar protection for your eyes.  You can also feel the water freeze on your eyes if you step directly out into the cold.
• Also since I know you’re a socal person- in the far north you can get as little as eight hours of daylight. 7AM to 3 PM.  You need to by the most obnoxiously bright light possible and sit beside it or you will actually literally develop psychosis in some cases.  It’s 4:30 and you need to take the dog out? it’s pitch black out.
• Everything is covered in ice, which will alternately cause you to slip and break something, burn, or actually tear off your skin.
• Christmas and the pressure to be jolly is much stronger in places with Winter. Get your Holly Jolly On In this Frozen Black Hellscape!!!  It’s why people go real bananas on the holiday lights.  they’re trying to stave off the void.

I used big sheets of felt from JoAnns. They usually got it on deep discount almost every other week now. Works the same as plastic, and it’s so lightweight, I just use thumbtacks to hang it. Then at the end of the cold, I can just fold it up and stow it away again. Also makes super-cheap warm interior for quilts. Just wash it first.

yournewapartment:

spoonie-living:

It’s okay to start feeling better on a day you’ve called out sick.

You might be in a cycle of guilts, telling yourself it obviously wasn’t that bad if you’re doing better. That you could have gone in after all. That you were blowing it out of proportion.

No. Stop.

If you’re feeling better, it’s not because you made the wrong choice. It’s because you stayed home and rested.

That’s what the sick day is for. That means it’s working.

!!!!!!

watts-of-dragons:

yatahisofficiallyridiculous:

geardrops:

jmathieson-fic:

amireal2u:

taraljc:

camwyn:

sunreon:

anextremelysadmeme:

hagar-972:

codeinetea:

vanishinginthepark:

codeinetea:

cyborg-cat-girl:

codeinetea:

cyborg-cat-girl:

codeinetea:

I have $24 to last me til Friday, what should I buy with it?

a pallet of ramen noodles

I hate ramen noodles tho

hmmmmm

bees?

Are you suggesting that I eat bees for a week

This is roughly what I make sure I have in my kitchen all the time along with rough estimates of local prices (MN). I buy a lot of things when they’re on sale and stockpile them. 

instant oatmeal packets with fruit in them – $3 probably and this can be breakfast all week and maybe even a lunch or dinner too since you usually get 10 packets

bag of rice – $2-3 depending on size. 1 cup dry rice makes enough for about two meals depending on what you add in. if you get cheap rice, rinse it before cooking

canned beans – usually under $1 per can – mix the can with your rice and you have a meal. chili-spiced beans will make bean tacos. Rinse non-spiced beans before adding to anything.

Tortilla – usually around $3 but you get like 8-10 of them. Tacos, wraps, and quesadillas are all fair game here

lettuce – $2 max around here, either a head of something or bagged precut depending on preference, use as a salad or on tacos

protein other than beans of some sort – probably $5-7 for meat, $2-3 for eggs. sometimes I can get bags of frozen chicken breasts in this price range and each is usually 2 meals if I add in a bunch of veggies. fry/scramble eggs and add to any of the options. 

your favorite stir fry sauce – $3ish

vegetables – $5ish. literally anything that you can 1. fry in a pan and 2. you’ll eat. fresh carrots are usually pretty cheap. get frozen if it’s cheaper and you’re strapped for cash/prep time on this part. 

alternative to stir fry:  pasta (~$2), fresh tomatoes (~$2), cheese (~$3). 

cheese and fruit if you have extra – look if your store has loyalty cards for free that you can load coupons on for cheese there’s always one it seems like.

ahh thank you!!!

Reblogging because there’s never knowing who’ll need it.

Adding also: the single most nutritious food on earth is potatoes in their peel. Potatoes + some milk and butter = everything you need. They don’t last all that long, but they’re fairly cheap and the quickest cheat to “How do I not fuck my body up.”

(Cooked potatoes’ll last a while in the fridge. Potatoes nearing the end of their useful lives? Cook them to half-done first, figure out what to do with them later.)

Easiest baked potatoes: slice thinly but not paper-like, spread like cards, brush with oil (a silicone baking brush is totes worth the little it costs), spread salt and pepper (a little less than you think you’d like), cover with foil, stick in oven or toaster-oven at 150C for 40min. (If you have the patience, at that point click up to 180C, remove the cover and add 10-20min.) Reheats well, lasts in the fridge longer than it’ll take you to nom.

Dead-Animal-Free Whole Protein: some legumes + some grain. AKA rice and lentils, or rice and beans. (Maybe some fried onion for flavor; onion’s cheap and stays good a descent while. Fried onion makes everything taste better and keeps forever in the freezer, so frying up a bunch and keeping portions is not a half-bad idea.) (If going for the beans option – lentils are cheaper around here but fuck if I know what it’s like in your area – dump some tomato sauce and oil in; canola or soy are best health-wise, and far cheaper than olive; avoid corn.) Oh, what does instant couscous go for in your area? It keeps for fucking ever, it’s usually cheap, and it takes well to any and all added taste.

If you get to choose, black lentils taste the best and need the least soak-time (0-20min), green lentils are best for cooked stuff and red lentils are best in soups. (Red lentils + potatoes + root vegetables of choice + spices; cut into small pieces, cook, run through the blender if you wanna [stick blender’s awesome], freeze in portions.)

When possible, get instant soup mix. Get the good instant soup mix. (The kind that’s not made primarily of sugar, yeast or both. The rest is optional.) Dump 1/2tsp (or more, but start on the low end) into couscous, or chicken, or sprinkle over potatoes being stuck in the oven. Whatever. It’ll make most cooked-food-type things taste better. And again, lasts forever on the shelf.

If  you can have eggs (goodness knows they’re sometimes expensive), dump some tomato sauce in a pan (tomato sauce lasts forever on the shelf), add some oil, onion/beans to cook in it, hot peppers if you wanna, then when it’s nearly ready crack an egg or two in. Hard-boiled eggs last a remarkably while in the fridge, so when eggs reach near the end of their usable lives, just hard-boil and stick in the fridge.

(Have eggs as often as you can, particularly as you have brain-shit going on. You need all the eggs, salt, and 60%-or-more chocolate you can get. Brains are made of cholesterol and salt, so folks with neuro or other brain shit need more of both. Potassium is also aces. You know what has the most potassium? Tomato paste.)

Grated cheese keeps in the freezer for ever. Grated cheese will make a lot of things taste nicer. Preserved lemon juice keeps forever in the fridge. Grated cheese + oil + lemon = instant and awesome pasta sauce that’ll liven up the weeks-old dry pasta in the fridge.

Slices bread also keeps well in the freezer. Try to have half a loaf or a loaf. Dry bread gets cut in cubes, mixed with oil and the aforementioned instant soup, stuck in oven at lowest until properly dry, then kept in an airtight jar to add to soups.

(Over-ripe tomatoes come cheaper. They get turned into soup or sauce, then frozen in portions.)

this is a very good post but why are we glossing over the fact that the alternative to ramen is bees

i have it on pretty good authority that bees are not an affordable eating alternative to ramen.

Seriously, bees are expensive

Trufax. 

And speaking as someone who is also living off oatmeal, beans, and brown rice, if you need recipes, I have them! 

Today I made 16 bean soup with chicken sausage and it was crazy good and I got 8 servings out of the one batch (froze half). I usually get the cheapest beans I can find, and GOYA bags of beans are usually $1-2. I soaked them overnight,rinsed them, and threw them in a gallon lidded saucepan with 2 boxes of chicken stock (also on sale for $2), two bay leaves, sauteed green pepper, onion, and celery, some garlic from a jar, about two tablespoons of dried herbs de provence,and the “fancy” bit was adding $6 bourbon and apple chicken sausages. You can actually sub veg stock for chicken and skip the sausage and make it vegan and it would still taste great.

Oh and I’ve been doing steel-cut oats. I don’t buy the name brand ones, I just pick whatever store brand/generic I can get for less than $4. They take about ½ an hour to make, but they’re super tasty and I make 2 cups

of dried oats at a time

with dried cranberries and that’s breakfast for 4 days at least. 

I’ve also been making black bean soup, red beans and rice, and curried potatoes and chick peas. I got 100 quart and pint take-away containers from Amazon for $20 and they all stack neatly and are perf for one serving of whatever.

Additionally, depending on where you live, whole rotisserie chickens are something like $4-$7 and are easily 4 – 6 servings of protein and on TOP of that, if you stick the carcass in a ziplock bag and then the freezer you have excellent soup makings. Using bones in soup literally squeezes all viable vitamins and minerals out of the suckers. Soup made from lots of bones is great to keep around if you get sick, it’ll feed and sooth you relatively easily and as you get better you can add noodles. ON TOP OF THAT, a quarter to a half cup of soup broth added to a lot of dishes also adds those nutrients PLUS flavor.

Here’s my “How to eat for a week on $30″ post.

don’t forget Good and Cheap: Eat Well on $4 A Day

Yall are clutch for this lmao cuz ima need this for about the first month after I move

Reblogging cause who knows what your followers are going through rn

neurodiversitysci:

runcibility:

thewightknight:

fthgurdy:

kimbureh:

you know I once googled how very organized housewives kept their homes super clean. And one thing they suggested was, if a task can be done in less than 2 minutes, do it right away.

And I have to think about this very often when depression tells me to delay doing things, if it tells me something is too much work right now etc.

If I can do it in less than 2 minutes I can do it no matter how exhausting it seems.

That’s what I tell myself. And it works!

I get more done and after 2 minutes I usually realize the pain doing this thing is not so horrible as my brain suggested. And then I keep going and expand the task and get real work done, holy shit

That’s…. actually brilliant. Two minutes is so short, it’s relatively an easy amount of time to FORCE yourself to work on something, even when you’re just completely deflated.

What works really really well for me is to compound annoying tasks that don’t require much thought with something actually pleasant. It took a long time to find the actual pleasant thing, but with audiobooks I can actually end up looking for chores to do because I want to continue listening to the book, and it doesn’t combine well with anything except the most mindless work.

That’s how I cleaned my bathroom top to bottom two weeks ago, after barely being able to pick up empty loo rolls from the floor for…well, months.

That’s how i’ve kept my house “company ready” for over a month now, a major accomplishment for me. I’m having guests over in a few hours and I’ve spent the day farting around on tumblr and taking walks out in the gorgeous weather instead of stress cleaning for the entire day.

That’s why I try and make the bed every morning. It’s a thing I can look at that’s neat and tidy and doesn’t take long at all, but helps me feel like I actually DID something.

That moment of accomplishment is sometime just enough momentum to push through the syrup of depression.

This works especially well in combination with what @jumpingjacktrash calls “junebugging.” Just don’t make my mistake and try it when you’re already running late to go somewhere.

nientedal:

nicocacolaaa:

asidewalksymphony:

intj-confessions:

sacredgayometry:

helloelloh:

When you start a job, WRITE DOWN THE DATE YOU STARTED. Also the date you ended, if it ended. Write down the address. Write down the supervisors name.

You have NO IDEA how many forms this will be on. Seriously. I dont care if you have to email it to yourself on your hello kitty email or something, write it down and keep it. 

Also!! The date any promotion or pay raise is implemented!!

^^^ They seriously ask for this on so many job forms.

Honestly, the best option is to keep it saved in some sort of document on your computer or phone. I use a certain template and just copy and paste it, and refill it every time I go to a new job. Maybe it’ll help others, so here’s the template I personally use.

(Name of the place you’re working at)
Supervisor/Boss name:
Address:
Phone number:
Job Title:
Starting pay:
Ending pay:
Reason for leaving:
Start (From):
End (To):

It’s all shit that you’ll be asked on pretty much any job application. So go forth and be organized kids.

It’s also nice to keep a semi-updated list of references! I have a word document with job history (which includes info from @asidewalksymphony’s post, as well as a general summary of duties) and one with references. I never delete old references, I just add new ones to the top. I try to update all of this, as well as my resume, whenever I’m about to start or leave a job, or a couple of times per year.

Remember to ask your references whether they’re willing to be a reference for you!

biggest-gaudiest-patronuses:

gallusrostromegalus:

Things you can do for your future self that you will really appreciate:

Caramelize, like, a whole ton of onions.

Really, get a whole ass bag of yellow onions, peel, chop, cry, put on a podcast and start stirring those tasty bastards. Delgaze every so often. Do like, 12, 15 onions until they’re a thick, dark brown paste of flavor then spoon them into an ice cube tray and freeze.

So later, when you’re tired and Don’t want fast food again, or it’s 3AM after a meds adjustment and you need curry right the fuck now, or it’s family dinner night and you want to look like an adult, sad, tired, mentally wobbly future you can crack open the freezer, dump a cube or three in the pan with the chicken or curry or stuffing and get all that delicious goodness delivered to your brain without the effort of a hot stove right then.

So next time you have three hours to kill and want to do some self care,

Caramelize so many fucking onions.

i’ve posted  before about the concerned looks i get from grocery store employees due to my regular habit of purchasing 40+ onions for caramelization purposes. they’re great in sandwiches

pro tips: 

• use butter instead of oil
• low heat + lots of time = carmalezation magic
• freeze in a large freezer bag squished flat
• they shrink in the pan, you’ll only get < ¼ the volume you start with.
• they last ages in the fridge