Thursday, be honest, am I strange?

No Spend
Baked chicken, salad, veggies, mash potatoes for dinner.  Plenty of chicken left for tonight and I will make low carb coleslaw.  Will use left over mash tomorrow.

     I have been wanting to ask this question for a while.  Am I strange?  Why I would ask? Well here are a few examples.  I cannot for the life of me get a swag bucks survey, they always time me out.  Why?  I'm female, white, lower middle class, over educated, undereducated, why?  Not that I really care about swag bucks it is just that they are aiming at the average population I would think.

     Next and this is just an example.  You go into someones house unexpectedly, they know you are coming in a few minutes and they are dashing around trying to clean, by doing dishes, the dish washer is full( I don't own a dishwasher)and they still have stacked an entire load and half of dirty dishes on the counter, meaning dishes have not been done in a while.  I leave my kitchen a mess all the time, and if someone sees it I don't even apologize, I am a busy person.  However if you don't work and all you do is stay home and take care of your kids and I know that is a hard job, how can you get so behind on the dishes?

     I remember years ago when I had three kids at home and I would call my laundry the never ending monster. I did at least 2 loads every day to keep up and I did not keep up. I still have a ton of laundry as the two youngest leave their laundry here in dump trucks I swear, but I just do the laundry until it is done. I don't understand getting so far behind that you have no clean underwear.  I'm not saying that I never was behind on laundry because believe me I have been, but not on a daily basis.  If you are home full time can you not keep up on the laundry? Ever?

     You have several children, you know that you go to church every Sunday.  In my culture kids have church clothes.  But every Sunday you drag in with wet hair, towing 3-5 kids who have mismatched clothes, holes in their tights, no socks, shoes that should have been thrown away, and obliviously nothing done with the hair. Again I know I am judging and that is wrong, but you can't keep their Sunday shoes in your closet?  That is what I did otherwise they went missing.  I also kept all white tights and church anklets in my drawers so they could not be worn at any other time.  You do not work outside the home, the home is your work, this is how you display it?

     You see someone shopping, you have your cart with fruit, veggies, cheese, meat, milk, etc.  You see many people at the store and these are people I know and their carts are full to the brim with pizza rolls, fish sticks, frozen pizza, snacks, mac and cheese boxes, boxes, boxes, boxes.  I don't get it?  You are home full time, you can't make oatmeal, and toast, or even cold cereal and toast.  Then clean that up and have a lunch like a sandwich, or some soup?  Plan a dinner with a veggie (and I don't care if it is a can of peas) a starch, and some kind of protein? No we are having a frozen pizza?

     I am not saying that I never bought a frozen pizza, but it was pretty rare.  They taste like cardboard.  Make a flippen pizza, or order one with a coupon as a treat but this a staple for many. I bought snacks for my kids.  I was very busy when they were younger and I mean very busy.  A baggy, of pretzels, or even cold cereal, pieces of fruit, home made cookies, crackers and peanut butter?  Is it so hard to throw any of this into a diaper bag?  I don't get it?  What do these people do with their time?

     I have many close friends that have completely different standards than me.  Mrs. clean lives across the street, she is perfect, a size 2 and I have never seen her with a hair out of place.  I love her, I just don't want to work that hard to maintain her standards.  I have another close friend who works in the health care field whose house is so unorganized and really dirty, I still think she is a fabulous cook and I would go to the mat for her, probably not a mat that came from her house but all said and done I love her. 

     I know this is a snarky post, and that I am judging, I just don't see myself as overly organized.  I don't think my house is perfect or spotless, if you saw my shop right now you would condemn it, I just don't know what people do with their time. I know I waste a lot of mine because I can and I want too. So my question is am I strange, or just a judgmental old hag who has forgotten how it was when my kids were little? Are my standards too high?

     I realize that many of my habits about the above such issues stem from frugality.  I did not have money for snacks, so I made cookies and things instead.  I could not buy many convenience foods because a small roast and spuds, and a bag of carrots would last longer and I could make better meals.  Whole wheat bread stays in the stomach longer, it is more filling.  I did not or could not buy new tights every week as my kids ran them running around.  I could only buy new dress shoes for them once a year at the shoe store that had a big sale after Christmas every year.  I made things last and took care of things, as I had no money to replace them.  We were broke all the time,(I think we still are), and I did not want people to know how hard I struggled to make it look like we were fine, even normal.  So did this make me strange?

     I have just been feeling strange lately, like I don't understand myself, why am I different?  Maybe I am not even likable.  Do people think things about me in the way I think about them?  These thoughts don't change my feelings for them, they just make me question myself. Am I strange?

I had better get to work the shop is starting to crawl in here and scare me.    

Have a great and productive day, go make a difference.

Kim