Wow, the summer’s going by so quickly, isn’t it?  Yesterday, I went to some garage sales with my girlfriend, and found a few things that made me happy.   Rich has been obsessing about growing potatoes in five gallon buckets, and I found a couple more buckets for next year’s “harvest.”  It’s amazing how thrilled you can be by finding buckets for 50 cents at a garage sale.  I also found a couple of perennials, and planted them yesterday.  It’s so hot here, that any time spent outside is too much time.  I also found a Shark Steam Mop for $15.  Since I just ordered one from Walmart for $70, I think the $15 is more in keeping with how often I’ll actually use it.  I tried the $15 version once already, and found it’s kind of tough to push (for me.)  I’m sure for other people it’s not difficult at all, but I struggled…Not all the time, but enough that my wrist hurt when I was done (and I didn’t do all the floors I wanted to do, darn it.)

I’ve decided I need to get some big garbage bags and go into my clothes closet and purge.  I have clothes in a closet in our basement from my years in banking that ended in 2005…They’re mostly suits, and not trendy, and I need to get rid of them.  What was I saving them for?  There’s a church that’s having a clothing giveaway next weekend, and I’m committed to getting rid of as many clothes as possible.  I have so many things that don’t fit or I don’t like, and it’s time to say goodbye.  It’s not like I don’t purge clothes, but apparently I don’t purge enough.  The other day, I was looking for a navy blue t-shirt with a silver buckle insert at the neckline..Could I find it anywhere?  No…So I asked Rich to help and his idea was to pull all of my clothes off of a shelf and onto the floor.  He found the shirt, but now I have a pile of clothes to refold.  I’m not fond of the shelf system, as I can’t seem to organize it to my liking and never find what I’m looking for…And the floor system is working great (haha), I can find anything…it’s also a great way to decide what to donate just by looking at them and saying to myself, “Will I ever wear that again?”   And I have more clothes than I could ever possibly wear, which is another problem.  I’d just like to downsize to the point that I know everything in my closet fits me,  and makes me happy….is that too much to ask?  (And yet I’ll bet after this purge I still won’t get to that point.)

Still working on the album for our great niece.  Today I found some brads on Ebay that would be perfect for the album, but when I went to check out, it said they couldn’t process the Paypal transaction….Since I was using my Paypal balance I knew it wasn’t my fault, but tried it several times, and still couldn’t get the payment to go through.  I tried signing off and back onto Paypal, and again, it didn’t work.  I was getting so frustrated, I wanted to throw my laptop across the room.  I’m not sure if I need to contact Ebay or Paypal, since I’m not sure where the problem lies.  I’m sure Ebay can’t afford to have their payment system stop working, so I thought I’d give it a little while and try again.  I hate it when things like this happen, because it makes me feel like I’m a deadbeat, even when I know I’m not.  Isn’t that nuts?  I remember when I was working, and at a local store, when the cashier told me my credit card didn’t work.  Keep in mind, I live in a small town and I was a bank manager, so that looked bad, especially as it was Christmas shopping time and there were a lot of people in line behind me, and the cashier wasn’t quiet about it.  I went home and contacted my credit card company, and they said my card had been hacked and someone tried to buy $6,000 worth of electronics online, but didn’t guess the expiration date correctly, so the credit card company cancelled my card to protect me, but didn’t think it was important enough to call me, only sent me a letter and a new credit card.  I’ve never understood how credit card companies can basically close your account and yet, think it’s not important enough to spend two minutes calling you for notification…Geez!  Luckily, this time it’s in the privacy of my own home, but I still don’t understand why Paypal isn’t working…And I hate calling any online retailer, as I know it’s going to be a long wait, and I just don’t have the patience for it.  Maybe this is a sign that I shouldn’t buy so much online…Darn it!

I decided to bite the bullet and contact Paypal.  After typing the issue online, they provided me with a six digit code and a telephone number to call.  It’s like trying to crack a safe, getting a contact telephone number for Paypal.. I was only on hold for a couple of minutes because I had a balance in my Paypal account.  Apparently if you don’t have a balance, the wait time can be pretty long. How do I know this?  They tell you that when you’re on hold…Good to know, huh?  The representative said, “I see you’ve tried to process this several times,” to which I wanted to say, “Because I had no choice,” but didn’t.  He said the reason it was declined….wait for it…..was because the seller no longer had the item available.  Couldn’t Ebay have given that as the reason instead of telling me my payment was declined?   So frustrating and so much time wasted, because a seller was too lazy to take down an item that’s no longer available.  Geez!

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