06/27/2025 – That Time of Year

It’s that time of year. No, sadly, not time yet to hear little raccoon kits visiting in the early morning hours though that’s coming soon.

No, it’s home assessment and tax analysis time and that means our monthly mortgage payment went up significantly. Ouch, ouch, ouch, or as Viola says, “WHAT?? Yee-OOWW!” Time to reassess what to cut back on, not that we have much left of that to do. Good thing we finally pulled the trigger on getting Mom’s arbor built after saving for so many years or that definitely, positively, would not have happened now.

We’ve found a less expensive food to set out for our outside cat visitors, one they actually like. Since the world news climate has gotten so mean this year (and we’re only 6 months in), it’s probably long past time to dump satellite TV. We can only get 4 channels of free TV where we live due to the lower elevation of our development but if we need to know anything, that’s what the Internet is for now, right? The cost wasn’t much on our pared down service, and every little bit helps.

Both Mom and Dad’s phones are 9 years old and Mom hoped to upgrade hers this year. While Dad’s has always worked perfectly and he’s keeping it, Mom’s has never been able to make or receive phone calls, despite numerous chats with Consumer Cellular who don’t understand it either, and is what she calls a glorified camera and photo viewer. Now, we’re happy to keep those given the squeeze our new mortgage amount comes out to.

Still, we’re grateful to be where we are. We’ve been paying extra to our mortgage principle for almost a year now and after personal adjustments and continuing that habit, this house will be paid off completely in 3 1/2 years. We’ll definitely feel the crunch now, regardless. We have a small amount of savings we plan to never touch. All the cats are doing as well as can be expected given everyone’s 13 years old, Viola will be 12 this year. We have no credit card debt and we still have jobs. We’ll be fine.

Mom’s been itching to making batches of Poor Man’s Soup (not-so-affectionately called Sweaty Sock Soup here sometimes) to freeze for future meals and next month sounds like perfect timing. Time to stock up on root veggies and rice!

Quint says, “Ugh. Root veggies. Double ugh. How about we find more marinated toys? We know you have some hiding somewhere, Mom.”

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A Colehaus Cats flashback:

2024 – No post
2023 – No post
2022 – A Monday Reminder
2021 – No post
2020 – No post
2019 – No post
2018 – Why Not Wednesday – Things on Cats
2017 – No post
2016 – One Step Forward . . .
2015 – No post
2014 – We’re a Featured Interview on Mousebreath!
2013 – No post
2012 – Spay Day for Tessa