Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

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MajGenl.Meade
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Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by MajGenl.Meade »

That was a saying of my son, Jesse. In primary school days when quizzed as to where anything had gone, he'd reply "Don't know. Perhaps it ran away to Steve's house".

Anyway, I just finished my first 5 a.m. to 2 p.m. shift at Walmart where I am NOT (surprisingly) the old geezer at the door saying "Good morning" (they don't really need that at 5 a.m.). No, I am a "Personal Shopper". Sounds good but it really means stonking around the place with a big cart with 8 bins and filling them according to orders placed via the interwebs overnight and on into the day.

I am slow. Partly because I'm slow. Mostly because I tended to try too hard to find exactly the right Gummy Biotics instead of "skip this order". Also the countless (four) times that my printer failed to produce an order label for products that I had actually managed to locate.

My super-knees are letting me know that Greeter is a better job. But you know . . . $15/hour. Not a living wage for the young folk who've left home and have to pay rent, car insurance, formula - I think there are 6 of them locally. But my dear wife has gone to work four days a week (8:10 to 3:40), earning less than $15/hr as a substitute teacher-assistant. She is voluntarily getting up at 4 a.m. with me so she can drop me off at Walmart on her way to exercise at the local free-for-old-farts city gymnasium. I walk home. That's not so exacting - it's only a mile in fine weather.

In bad weather it will be a lot longer.
For Christianity, by identifying truth with faith, must teach-and, properly understood, does teach-that any interference with the truth is immoral. A Christian with faith has nothing to fear from the facts

Burning Petard
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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by Burning Petard »

MayGenl, I feel your pain -- sort of. Right now, I don't think I could walk a mile after working even half a shift in great weather. I am jealous of your gym situation. I pay $280 a year at the local community Senior Center for general membership and then gym fees which does not include swimming pool fees which has been closed for repair for more than a year. The place is open 5 days a week, 7am to 3pm. It does offer a cafeteria lunch which is slightly cheaper than local sit-down restaurants, but the menu is absurd; the dietitian in charge admits it is too much fat and too much salt, even for healthy people with no medical restrictions. She claims everybody loves the cook so she can't fire him or get him to change.

snailgate.

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TPFKA@W
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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by TPFKA@W »

Ouch. I am in a better situation. Hubby and I get to travel a lot and stay busy that way. We hope to do that as long as our health allows and if savings does not run out. If that happens it's the poor house side in a nursing home for us. Of course it only takes one good catastrophic health incident for everything to go south.

liberty
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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by liberty »

MajGenl.Meade wrote:
Mon Oct 03, 2022 6:38 pm
That was a saying of my son, Jesse. In primary school days when quizzed as to where anything had gone, he'd reply "Don't know. Perhaps it ran away to Steve's house".

Anyway, I just finished my first 5 a.m. to 2 p.m. shift at Walmart where I am NOT (surprisingly) the old geezer at the door saying "Good morning" (they don't really need that at 5 a.m.). No, I am a "Personal Shopper". Sounds good but it really means stonking around the place with a big cart with 8 bins and filling them according to orders placed via the interwebs overnight and on into the day.

I am slow. Partly because I'm slow. Mostly because I tended to try too hard to find exactly the right Gummy Biotics instead of "skip this order". Also the countless (four) times that my printer failed to produce an order label for products that I had actually managed to locate.

My super-knees are letting me know that Greeter is a better job. But you know . . . $15/hour. Not a living wage for the young folk who've left home and have to pay rent, car insurance, formula - I think there are 6 of them locally. But my dear wife has gone to work four days a week (8:10 to 3:40), earning less than $15/hr as a substitute teacher-assistant. She is voluntarily getting up at 4 a.m. with me so she can drop me off at Walmart on her way to exercise at the local free-for-old-farts city gymnasium. I walk home. That's not so exacting - it's only a mile in fine weather.

In bad weather it will be a lot longer.
Do you have to work, or do you choose to work? Weren't you a successful business owner? Did you spend a bundle of cash in Africa?

I have three incomes. I could live on two incomes and retire from my job, but I love working. I especially love my work: I get paid to solve puzzles. The work is interesting and always different; of course, some frustrations happen from time to time, but I imagine that's true of any job. I especially like it when I'm working on a fault that looks like it's going to beat me, but then suddenly, I turn the tables and fix it; that is very satisfying. Sometimes I get beaten and have to escalate a job, but they don't happen very often. Hell, I'd almost do the job for nothing, just for the use of the company car. I know I can't do it forever. I know the day will come when I will lose my efficiency; it'll be tough for me to hang it up. But I've told my boss when that day comes, just let me know, and I'll train my replacement.

When that day comes, I think I'll try my hands at raising hogs; my wife thinks I'm a monster. She asks me how you can eat your babies, and when she says that, I think of what Bicycle Bill would say, "one bite at a time." But honestly, I don't know if I could eat animals that I hand-raised myself.
I expected to be placed in an air force combat position such as security police, forward air control, pararescue or E.O.D. I would have liked dog handler. I had heard about the dog Nemo and was highly impressed. “SFB” is sad I didn’t end up in E.O.D.

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Joe Guy
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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by Joe Guy »

liberty wrote:
Wed Oct 05, 2022 5:02 am
But honestly, I don't know if I could eat animals that I hand-raised myself.
I know I couldn't do that.

I even cry when I slice an onion that I've hand-raised.

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MajGenl.Meade
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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by MajGenl.Meade »

Do you have to work, or do you choose to work? Weren't you a successful business owner? Did you spend a bundle of cash in Africa?
We could muddle by on SocSec and savings, but jobs will help us afford a trip to South Africa Feb/Mar (we hope). Think of it as Florida and us as snow-birds. And we do feel the need to do something to keep us moving.

I was not a business owner; my wife was successful as such. It's not so much that we spent a bundle as we lost quite a bit recently. We'd transferred $$$ to SA to buy a house and that was a victim of post-Covid rethinking; we lost many (too many) thousands sending that money out and then back. It was perfect exchange-rate timing very much not.

Yes, there's satisfaction in a job well done. Solving problems can range from quite easy to complex, but there's a pleasure in getting to the answer in either case.

I'd have no problem eating them animals, but I don't have the stomach for slaughtering and dressing. Yuck. I was reminded inexorably of Brian Aldiss and his book, "The Hand-reared Boy". Long time since I read any of his.
For Christianity, by identifying truth with faith, must teach-and, properly understood, does teach-that any interference with the truth is immoral. A Christian with faith has nothing to fear from the facts

Big RR
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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by Big RR »

I understand Meade; I could afford to retire if I chose to, but I continue to work mainly because it fills the time (and the extra money is always good). I have some flexibility and can work remotely (permitting us to travel and me to work from where we are), but I don't have a lot of hobbies to occupy the time, and you can't travel all the time. As long as my health holds out, I'll continue working.

FWIW, I have a friend in his early 70s who recently got sciatica which does not respond to treatment Much (he's still trying different options) and can no longer travel (or do a lot with his grandkids for that matter). He's a lot more stationary than he ever was, and it's weighing on him heavily. While we can, I think it is in my interest to develop less active hobbies--I realize I won't be able to ski forever. For me, I'm starting to learn how to work with photoshop more to work on my photos, but we'll see.

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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by Burning Petard »

WHAAA!?! Liberty posted something that seems to be an expression of good human qualities?

I'l admit I never thought I would be ever hitting these particular keystrokes, but Thank you Mr. Liberty.

snailgate

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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by Bicycle Bill »

liberty wrote:
Wed Oct 05, 2022 5:02 am
... I think I'll try my hands at raising hogs; my wife thinks I'm a monster. She asks me how you can eat your babies, and when she says that, I think of what Bicycle Bill would say, "one bite at a time."
For hogs (pork), I'd have probably said, "With mustard and applesauce."
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Yes, I suppose I could agree with you ... but then we'd both be wrong, wouldn't we?

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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by liberty »

Burning Petard wrote:
Thu Oct 06, 2022 3:28 pm
WHAAA!?! Liberty posted something that seems to be an expression of good human qualities?

I'l admit I never thought I would be ever hitting these particular keystrokes, but Thank you Mr. Liberty.

snailgate
What are you referring to, my reluctance to kill and eat an animal I would have raised like a baby? In some cultures, that would be considered an unmanly weakness. So, what can I say; I love meat, but I wouldn’t want to work in a slaughterhouse.

By bottle feeding the little critter, cleaning it, and getting up in the middle of the night to feed it and check on it, I think I’d get too attached to it and see it more as a baby than an animal. And even after it was grown, that attachment would still be there. I wouldn’t be able to kill it or hire someone to do the dirty work for me. However, I could use them as breeding stock or sell them at auction. I could justify that as sending them off to the greener pastures. Your children have to leave home sometime. My wife says she couldn’t even do that.
I expected to be placed in an air force combat position such as security police, forward air control, pararescue or E.O.D. I would have liked dog handler. I had heard about the dog Nemo and was highly impressed. “SFB” is sad I didn’t end up in E.O.D.

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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by BoSoxGal »

My aunt and uncle had a hobby farm when I was a child. They raised pigs and sheep, kept chickens and once raised a cow for meat - his name was Alexander and there is a photo of me feeding him from a bottle when he was very small. My uncle would torment me later when we visited them for dinner by telling me I was eating Alexander; his meat lasted a couple of years for them just the two and occasional guests. Whenever it was time to slaughter anything they loaded the animals up on a truck and said goodbye - the hard bits were left to the slaughterhouse guys.

I could never kill an animal I raised for meat. I’ve been right there with each of my dogs when they needed to leave this world, but that’s a different thing. I definitely carry guilt for my participation in the meat industry and wish I had the willpower to be vegan. I tried it and it didn’t take. I do try to limit my consumption of meat and when it comes to pork and beef I pay a substantial premium for humanely raised but I buy my chicken and eggs from the usual stock and I’m sure most of those chickens live a miserable life.
For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by MajGenl.Meade »

Steve's mom sent it home.

Well, that didn't last long. Found out that I'm expected to work every Sunday - my days off are Saturday and Thursday. Now I was prepared to be asked to work the occasional Sunday, perhaps 1 per month, but every Sunday? Not on.

For one, I want to go to church and that's where our friends and connections are longest and strongest. For seconds, it destroys our Saturday bi-monthly Bridge/dinner ["Sorry folks, you have to go home at 8 because I'm working 5 a.m. tomorrow and I must go to bed at 9 tonight"]. For thirds, my feet really, really, really hurt. And fourth but almost more important, getting up at 4 a.m. will destroy my marriage.

Never mind. There must be something I can do. Excited to get a call today - I will be a poll worker on Election Day. That's $100 in the bin for working 5:45 a.m. to about 9 p.m. What a deal that is, eh? I shall be Returns Officer which apparently means I get to do poll-worker stuff PLUS return all the table-cloths, posters, Union flags and er . . . the ballots to HQ.

Pity it's only one day. Who knows - this could be the beginning of a new career as a target of opportunity
For Christianity, by identifying truth with faith, must teach-and, properly understood, does teach-that any interference with the truth is immoral. A Christian with faith has nothing to fear from the facts

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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by TPFKA@W »

Big RR wrote:
Thu Oct 06, 2022 1:31 pm
and you can't travel all the time.
We can. A lot of our travel consists of, “hey let’s try and get lost in Ohio “ (you can’t get lost in Indiana) or “I really want to visit the Bass Pro in Memphis “. Maybe we will tire of it eventually.

Big RR
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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by Big RR »

I will be a poll worker on Election Day. That's $100 in the bin for working 5:45 a.m. to about 9 p.m.
Beats jury duty; last time I served on a jury I got $5.00 a day; I did get free parkingaout a half mile from the courthouse though.

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Re: Retirement - the option that ran away to Steve's house

Post by MGMcAnick »

Mrs Mc grew up on a farm where they raised and butchered chickens for the freezer by the dozens. We now buy boneless chicken breasts at $2.79/lb. They were $1.79 not long ago. She says "I didn't go to college for seven years (off and on) to ever have to kill and pluck another chicken".

They also raised their own beef, but left the butchering to a pro in town. One for the family, a couple dozen for to sell. Steak was nothing special. He mother always insisted cooking it to VERY well done. When she started college, a guy took her to a nice restaurant to try and impress her. The waiter asked how she'd like her steak cooked. She had no idea that there was an option. He suggested "medium". She didn't know steak could be good. The next time she went home she asked her mother to pull her steak from the broiler under the gas stove's oven burner "a little early". Her dad asked for the same. Her mother complied, but was deeply offended.
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