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Over the past dozen or so years I’ve grown to become what I would call a patient buyer.  If something looks too expensive I wait it out for the right opportunity before nabbing it.  More often than not this strategy has ended in dissapointment as I’ve gone months (sometimes years) without getting the latest video games while my friends have all played them.  I’ve put off home improvements due to the cost and I find that I live below the everyday persons standards.  Ok put simply I’m a stingy bastard.

As the location I’ve been working to liquidate grows ever closer to its demise I’ve watched the prices on things and made my list of what I’d buy if it were the right price.  You may or may not be able to guess, but its not a very long list.  Perhaps a half dozen things even caught my eye and less than half of them are something I’d actually ever buy. 

I wrote a while back about how I’m starting to work on remodeling the kitchen.  One of the items I had on my wish list was a stainless steel wall oven unit.  Sadly and somewhat happily it sold before it ever got to a reasonable price.  Sadly because it puts finishing my kitchen further off, but happily because that cash hasn’t yet escaped me.

The other Item I’ve been eyeballing for a while now is some lodgestone castlewall pavers.  I made up my mind years ago (litterally) that I wanted to do a feature in my yard using them.  I’ve never done it because I simply wasn’t willing to pay full price or even a moderate discount for the brick.  This time it got the better of me though.  I told myself if enough of the brick was still there when it reached 60% off that I’d take it.  Well I ended up paying about 34% of its original retail for four pallets of pavers.  Then I got over a hundred more for ten bucks.  In a liquidation sale the stores not only sell off merchandise, but also fixtures.  There was a decorative feature in the store that used these lodgestone pavers and I bought it priced as a fixture.  The trick there is that the liquidator has to get rid of various things so he can turn over the building to the landlord.  By offering to tear down the display he got some free labor and I only paid less than ten cents per brick.  A deal I was quite happy with.

Anyhow, I’m planning on using the stone pavers to build a waist height raised bed garden in the back yard come spring.  (Another month or so)  I’m not one for gardening or doing anything oudoors really, but I know my mother loves it.  She’s getting on in years so making it the kind of thing she can do without getting down on her knees is important to me.  So far it cost me about $350.  $310 for the retail discounted brick, $10 for the fixture brick, and another $30 in gasoline and a meal for my helper.  It took four truckloads plus a day and a half to haul all that brick home.  By truck loads I do mean loads too…  I loaded my Dodge Ram 1500 down to the point where the bed was almost setting on the back tires and the tires were bulging out at the sides at each run.  I was trying despirately to avoid having to make a fifth run to get the last of it.

At least it hasn’t broken me though.  I’ve been working nonstop for quite some time now, clocking in at least twenty hours of overtime each week.  The day I took to haul home the brick was the first sunny day I’ve seen in months, and it happened to be my only day off.  Yes I’m feeling a bit overworked and yes thats why I’m writing my weekly blog update on a monday night instead of on the weekend.  The last few paychecks have squared away some unexpected expenses that had arisen before and I expect the next upcoming one to have enough extra left over to cover the full $350 I invested in the pavers. 

Now its just down to finding enough time off work to install them, and to figuring where to get dirt to backfill the new garden.  I’m sure I see free dirt from time to time, so it shouldn’t be too hard.  I just need to find some during the right time so I can get it done before its time to start the spring planting.  I guess I’ll watch cragslist for stuff I can get for free and I’m concidering the city landfill.  They’re bound to have compost I can pick up for a song and a dance. 

Well thats enough for this week.