The Unemployed Husband

The Husband has had some free time lately, to say the least. As I've mentioned, he has been doing a great job on picking up some ad hoc work and earning extra income. In addition, he has been busy around the house, accomplishing some of those little projects you just never seem to have time for. Well, until, ya know, you don't have a job.

Insulation and Caulking
He did an inspection of the exterior of the house, identifying some significant nooks and crannies that needed to be filled in, primarily around the front windows and the electric meter. He was mostly able to use tubes of caulk we had in the garage. For the small required purchases, he used a gift card from Christmas.

Painting
When we bought this house, it came with a pretty large supply of interior paint. Indentifying and using this paint has been on the to-do list for quite some time. The Husband did a complete inventory of the garage paint, labeling everything we could use and giving the rest to a friend. Then he did a round of touch up painting. The house looks very nice!

Selling & Donating
We have been doing the great purge of 'stuff' from our house. We've been working together on the sorting and going through, but the Husband has been handling the running around town to sell to various used and consignment stores. As well as taking the donations to Goodwill and getting us receipts for next years taxes. This is always my least favorite part of the process, so I am very happy he has taken the lead.

Install Compost Bins
He put in two food waste compost bins in the backyard. This should enable us to cancel our yard waste service, there by lowering our garbage bill over all.

Riding his Motorcycle
Ok, so this is a win-win for both of us. He enjoys it and it saves us money on gas for running simple errands around town. The weather here has been pretty nice *knock on wood*. He has been loading up his backpack and taking his bike every chance he gets. Its $8 to fill up that tank vs. the $50 to fill up the SUV. Pretty significant savings.

I am really proud of the Husband. Even though he has been out of work almost a month now, with no end in sight, he has been doing a really good job of keeping busy. He is maintaining work contacts and keeping himself out there, but also accomplishing some very real progress around here. As this stretches on, I think we are going to begin to struggle to find meaningful, productive things to keep him going.

The word for March will be: Brainstorming.