Day 355

The face of the meddler!

Challenges. Everyone has them, including me! You know, those small trials that show up in some form every day. Being a 'fix-it' person, I'm always poking my nose in someone else's affairs. What is it the Bible says about this? Oh, yes, Matthew 7:3 "And why worry about a speck in your friend's eye when you have a log in your own?" (New Living Translation) My meddling is well intentioned, but I am determined to stop doing this. I have my own challenges to resolve! I'll stick to sharing my challenges and what I'm doing to try and remedy those issues here, but I'm done with offering up solutions to others about their challenges. Because of the log in my own eye I have been failing to see how my messing about in other people's lives is causing them to dislike me. Honestly, I was just trying to help. New resolution: Wait to be asked, Nancy.

The work to figure out my next blog series continues. At the same time, I've been reading other blog postings focused on lowering grocery costs. Some of these people are spending between $27 and $35 USD per person, per week on groceries! My current spending level is at about $75 USD per person, per week. Part of this is not groceries at all, but are indeed other household necessities that I usually purchase along with groceries. I also know that we waste a fair amount of food and that has to stop. I've been toying with the idea of trying to feed myself on $27 USD for a week and see what it's like. First, I think it would force me to eat NORMAL portions. (An area where I'm clearly challenged!) Secondly, if I could really devise a plan that would work for those in my household, then it would be wonderful! With the cost of foods skyrocketing, I need to find a better way to feed myself and others so we can be comfortable with less.

After taking some time to think about this over the last few weeks, it seems to me that if I limit the variety and eat the same breakfast, lunch, snack and dinner each day, with little variation during the week, it can be done. Groceries are expensive and buying a large variety of things is where waste and cost are heavily centered. So, next week when I shop for my groceries, I will get the things that my family needs and then I will go back to the store armed with my grocery list made from my menu planning and with only $27 USD cash in hand. I will not use any of the food I currently have on hand for myself (will use that only for my family) and I think this will be the menu for my week:

• Breakfast - Scrambled Egg w/ Toast (5 days 2 eggs, 2 days 1 egg)
• Lunch - Vegetable Soup and Grilled Cheese Sandwich
• Snack - Piece of Fruit
• Dinner - Beans and Rice w/ Cucumber Salad

This is the grocery list I will be using:

• 1 Dozen eggs
• 1 lb. Dry beans
• 1 small Cabbage
• 2 loves French Bread (my HEB makes these daily and sells them for $1 USD!)
• Cheese
• 1 lb. Rice
• Bouillon
• Cooking Spray
• 7 Pieces of Fruit (the most appropriate)
• Can, Crushed Tomatoes
• Can, Diced Tomatoes
• 2 cucumbers
• 2  fresh tomatoes
• 2 onions
• 2 Lemons
• 1/2 lb. Ground Beef (or turkey, chicken, pork...which ever is better priced)
• Tea bags

My goal is to make these 17 items create the menu listed above. I've checked my receipts from recent grocery shopping events and I believe I can make the above shopping list fit within the budget. I have a stash of saved salt and pepper packs from fast food that will come in handy and I'll use those to season the food. I will be trying to use less than $27 and will retain any leftover cash to add to the next week so I can eventually buy some pantry staples like oatmeal, flour, sugar and oil.

There may come a time when I am faced with the challenge of little funds for food. Since I'm always talking to my son about how good it is to be prepared, I think I need to put my money where my mouth is and show what that means in reality. I really want to know that it can be done. Yes, there is very little meat here, but I'll use a quarter pound of meat in the soup and the other quarter pound in the beans, which will give me good flavor!

Here are some questions I'll be asking myself along the way:

1. What are the challenges with eating the same breakfast, lunch, snack and dinner each day for 7 days?
2. Can I come up with more menu plans where the ingredients can be bought with my $27?
3. What are some other ways I can acquire food without having to buy it? (i.e. grow some?)
4. What are the challenges and benefits to a steeply restricted food budget?
5. What are the things I will do differently the next week?
6. What would I be able to do if I added just $8 USD to the weekly budget?

When I was single and living alone from 1977 to 1981, my weekly grocery budget was never above $30 USD. Yes, it's now 33 years later, but if I could do it then, why not try to do it now? I'll write about this all next week and we'll see what happens. For now, I'm just working on my grocery list and figuring out the menu plan so that the whole event goes well. Thanks for stopping by and checking up on old HV. Until tomorrow, when I'm sure the plan will change (have I said how much I LOVE change, lately?) Godspeed, Voyagers!!

Day 352 - 354

11 more days
in this 365 day series!

Welcome to the last Sunday in June 2014! Does that sound like today is going to be really special? Well, it is!! Every day is just another opportunity to celebrate in my world. I'm present in all of my days (mentally and physically) and I try not to waste too much of the time I have here on earth being gloomy. It's a personal choice thing. I'm here; I'm me; I'm happy!!

Sundays are my stay-at-home day. I do not 'plan' anything outside my home on Sunday if I can avoid it. Although my family are real homebodies, I am a person who must be out-and-about quite a bit of the time. In order to fully 'balance' my life, I need one day a week where I do not need to leave my home for any reason. For me, that is Sunday!

This lovely day at home was immediately preceded by a Saturday with my sister. We had a great time visiting the graves of a couple of family members. Many of our family members are interred in the area where my sister lives (she still resides in our hometown). About 2 or 3 times a year, we pick up fresh flowers and visit as many grave sites as we can fit into that day. The tremendous number of graves and locations make it impossible to see them all in a single day, but we do our best. We used to make this a two day event, but we're getting older and we're good with one full day a few times a year. There is something about visiting the graves of loved ones that humbles me. With my sister, we use the time to reminisce about the family member and enjoy decorating the grave site. Our brother is one we almost always visit. He is our most recent loss and I think we both felt the pain of his passing very strongly. This time, we put out hot pink and white roses with babies breath:

Cemeteries are sometimes beautiful places and always interesting. I love history and so there is always lots of history to read about on headstones. The roses above are the ones we put out yesterday and are on two different graves in two very different cemeteries. Our brother is resting in a small cemetery in a rural location where the wind never stops blowing. On this particular day, that cemetery was so full of grasshoppers were were latterly driving through clouds of them and chasing them out of the car. I was driving or I would have video taped the excitement! The other cemetery we visited is one of the most beautiful places in the big city of Dallas. I love going there.

While driving through the little town to get to our brothers grave site, we came upon a car show in full swing in the middle of town! It was so fantastic that when we finished at our brother's grave, we made a stop and walked around the show for a few minutes until the sun got to me! Here is a little of what we saw:

The black Coupe de Ville (pictured in the lower right hand corner) was built the year I was born.  With lovingly cared for black and white upholstery, she's still goin' and so am I! There were cars there that were older than my parents! It was so fun to walk around that place, but would have been even better had the sun not started burring me to bits! It was cloudy, but deceptively so! This was the 6th Annual RPM Hot Rod Hay Ride Car Show in Valley View, Texas! It was put on by Time Machine Car Shows. Very well done. So fun and I loved it!! You just never know what you'll find on a sunny/cloudy/windy day outside in your area. Go visit loved one's graves with someone you love. No telling what you find while on the road!

The week coming up will be a great one. I have some time-off around the holiday. There will likely be a parade in the neighborhood for 4th of July and I have LOTS of great meals planned for the week. Here's what we'll be enjoying this week:

• Monday - (Soup and Sandwich Night) Homemade Mushroom Soup and Roast Beef Sandwich
• Tuesday - (Salad Night) Composed Chopped Cold-Meat Salad
• Wednesday - (French Bread Pizza Night) Pepperoni, Veggie and Whatever Pizzas
• Thursday - (Old Classics Night) Beef and Bean Nachos
• Friday - (Burger Night) 4th of July Burgers!!
• Saturday - (Chef's Choice Night) Vegetable Plate
• Sunday - (The Big Show Night) Ham with Potatoes and Vegetables

I'll share how I put these meals together and what it's costing throughout the upcoming week. One of the things I want to do is save some money on groceries in the future, without sacrificing on flavor or quality. The first thing to do is eliminate the waste. I'll write more about how I'm planning to do that, later.

Thanks for stopping by and reading up about the weekend and plans for next week. I hope your week is shaping up the way you'd like for it to, also. Until next time, Godspeed, Voyagers!!

Days 349 - 351

The days are marching on and so are the plans for the next series. I've narrowed the focus of the next 365 day series down to the two things I love best: food and writing. So, either I'm going to target recipes with stories or just stories, in general. Yes, I will continue to work on me, but it's time for a year of real, focused fun for the HumbleVoyager!

The last few days I've just been working hard and trying to write recipes as I cook. This is going to take some organization if I'm going to make this a series starting in July. It's all in the preparations and I know that.

Be sure to check out the Chili Pie recipe added today and make some for yourself, if you dare! I didn't say it was healthy, but it is a comforting food from my youth.

Thanks for stopping by to see how it's going. I'll be back soon with more of life with The HumbleVoyager. Until then, Godspeed, Voyagers!!

Day 348

So, this is what it's like to be 17 days away from completing a 365 day series. Hmmm................that's me thinking about the situation. Actually, I'm not thinking much of anything tonight. I'm just rolling along in the fading light of day 348 and looking forward to the freshness of day 349!

Recently I realized that I'd make life SO much easier for myself if I organized the weekly meals into 'themed' nights. This way I would be able to create my shopping list each week in terms of the different meals I need to prepare. You may or may not know it, but I've been working to prepare meals that result in limited leftovers. I like leftovers, but others here do not. This means I can stand to have one or two servings leftover for lunch the next day or so, but no more than that. My small family of 3 is easy to cook for, but I grew up cooking for 6, who ate like 12! It's been tough trying to rein in my large-batch cooking habits. Anyway, I've worked through lots of mental lists on this subject (ooohhh...yes! Lists....) and here is how the themes have landed:

• Mondays - Soup and Sandwich night
• Tuesdays - Salad night
• Wednesdays - French Bread Pizza night
• Thursdays - Old Classics night
• Fridays - Burger night (a favorite!)
• Saturdays - Chef's Choice night
• Sundays - The Big Show night (i.e. Pot Roast, Ham, etc.)

For example, here is the menu for this week:

• Monday - Homemade Creamy Tomato Basil Soup and Grilled Cheese Sandwiches
• Tuesday - Salad Olivier
• Wednesday - French Bread Pepperoni and Veggie Pizzas
• Thursday - Chili Pie (AKA: Frito Pie) and Cucumber and Tomato Salad
• Friday - Cheese Burgers and Oven Fries
• Saturday - Cheese Omelet with Bacon and French Toast (I LOVE Breakfast for supper!)
• Sunday - Pan Seared Prime Filet Mignon with Mushrooms and Roasted Potatoes

Having a general theme assigned to each night (with allowances for deviation when the mood strikes) is really making it easy for me to plan meals in a more compartmentalized way. While making my shopping list I can think in terms of what I'm making and know when I have to have the items. For instance, this Tuesday night is Salad Olivier. To help with preparations, I'll use a rotisserie chicken and will pick that up fresh on my way home from work on Tuesday evening. That will make putting the salad together, once I get home, a snap! It also means I didn't have to worry about that ingredient during the 'big' shopping day on Saturday! At the same time I pick up the rotisserie chicken on Tuesday, I'll also buy a couple of loaves of the fresh french bread for Wednesday night's pizza. This way I don't have the ingredients sitting around since Saturday waiting for their night on the plate. Fresher food; happier people!

Tonights homemade Creamy Basil Tomato soup (as easy as opening a tin of condensed soup) and grilled cheese sandwiches were a big hit. My photography is sadly lacking, but this is what they looked like:

It is really so easy to make the soup I don't know why I never tried to do it before. The grilled cheese is just a mixture of grated Irish Cheddar and Gruyere on good bread then slowly grilled in butter. It really was yummy!

The day was really quiet at work and now I'm just enjoying the evening doing the activity I love best in the world, writing. Thanks for dropping by and I hope you'll stop by again, real soon! Until then, Godspeed, Voyagers!!

Pot Roast

This is my Pot Roast video that can be found on YouTube. I hope you enjoy it! The video reflects how I usually prepare pot roast and the cuts of meat I might use. This method is pretty easy and always tastes great!

At the end of this video it talks about going to nancycooks.com for the recipe. I don't have that website any longer. I'll post the recipe on humblevoyager.com, some rainy day.  **smile**

I wanted to link to this video in my last blog posting, but had some difficulty accomplishing the task. But where there is a will there is a way and here it is!! Enjoy!!

Day 347

Today was a nice, quiet Sunday. I cooked, surfed the web, watched YouTube videos of my favorite people and worked on some 'lists' I've been wanting to make. **smile** Yes, I'm in heaven today.

I cooked Pinto Beans and added the recipe to the list. Be sure to check out the growing list of recipes in the right sidebar area of the blog. This was the easy-peasy slow cooker method of cooking beans and they turned out GREAT!

I also pot roasted a batch of what my butcher calls Boneless Texas Ribs. I haven't a clue what to expect, but I figured it would be fun to just try pot roasting the meat and see what happens. I have a video on YouTube about pot roast and for some reason I can't seem to link it below so you can see how I usually do this. I'll post a separate link after this blog is up so you can get to it. I hope you enjoy watching that!

That's it for today. I still have some laundry calling my name and I'll get right on that. Thanks for stopping by and checking out the beans and such. Until next time when I might share my latest list, Godspeed, Voyagers!!

Days 343 - 346

Welcome to the longest day of the year! At 5:51A.M. CDT, summer began. We are looking forward to 100+ degrees in our not too distant future. I can't stand to be in the direct sunlight too much, but I do enjoy summer in general.

There was much discussion today between me and certain members of my family, about being 'mentioned' in my blog postings. There are people in my life who do not wish to be mentioned in my blog any longer. I'll be going through the old postings and removing or blocking text that includes them. I don't mention names too much, but one particular close family member is upset by my mentions of him and I will honor his desire to not be discussed or referenced in any way. It may take me awhile to make the changes to the existing blog posts, but I'll do my best to get that work done right away. I'm always sorry if I offend anyone. That is never my intention. I think I'm too blunt sometimes or maybe too honest. Please don't really like to hear (or in this case, read) about themselves. Hearing that I've hurt someone is a very humbling thing.

Things growing around me here in Central Texas!

I'm still working on what my next 365 day series will be about. It's pretty clear that no one cares about this but me, but I write this blog for myself mostly so I'm okay with that. If there is one thing I've learned in this life, it's do what makes yourself happy. Writing is happiness to me, so onward and upward. I'm enjoying what goes on with a 365 day focus. This time around I want to focus on enjoying myself rather than make changes to my life. Those happen all the time without any help from me!

If you are a regular reader of my blog, please let me know what you'd most like to see me write about. Would you like to hear about what goes on in my kitchen? How about the short stories that are running around in my head? Would you like to read those? Or is it pictures of the days of my life here in Central Texas that you'd like to see? Let me know by answering my blog poll!

Thanks for stopping by today. I'm catching up on a few errands and doing the best I can not to upset people. I hope you're having a great day wherever you are! Until next time when I'm likely to share something that will offend someone, Godspeed, Voyagers!!

Days 340 - 342

I started out tonight writing about things like Independent Thinking and the world of 'The Worst Case Scenario' and quickly realized that I was being very intense for no reason. I'm on day 342 of 365, trying to make changes to my life and how I live. I won't bore you right now with an evaluation, (I'll save that for day 365) but I do want to share with you where my head is today.

I've come a long way in the last 342 days. For almost a year, the focus has been like listening to myself breathe. Every breath resonated in my chest and I tried to put deep meaning on every single one. It wasn't always easy for me to look at myself. In so many ways I'm not what I wanted to be, but in other ways I'm amazed at who I am. Life experience is unique for every individual and I'm no different. That being said, my life experience is not all sunshine and daisies. I have good, bad and ugly woven like threads of gold, green and black throughout every part of my life. Funny how the gold shines so bright it actually makes the green and black look strangely important; valuable.

Although I've often thought about how I might have a different life if I'd been able to change some experiences. If I were able to make those changes then I might not have the love of the man in my life or the joy of the gift from God that is my son. What would I actually go back and change? Maybe some choices, definitely how I thought about myself; how I valued myself. The time I wasted with very low self-esteem can't be recaptured. Some of that was based on how I held myself up against others, but some of it was just based on what I heard others say about me. Well guess what? I'm not what others say I am! Really?? NOPE, I'm not! (And neither are you!)

It's tempting to select a few words to describe myself and where I am in life, but I'm not just a collection of words. I don't know why I'm compelled to define myself, but I'm going to continue to resist the temptation to get down into the mud of life and write my own definition. I'm not going to be a collection of a few words that end up on a headstone in the end. I am Nancy; a person of many facets and one who is loved my many for many different reasons. In the meantime, I've got a life to live in the skin God gave me. Please, God, help me take better care of the skin I'm in!

Until next time be and love yourself and, Godspeed, Voyagers!!

What's For Supper?

I wanted to prove that it is possible to create and eat delicious food and still be true to your plans. This evening, with a little inspiration from Noreen's Kitchen on YouTube, I made Pizza Burgers with Cucumber Salad. It was really delicious! My family loved it. I modified the recipe slightly, you know, as you do, to make it work for me and the ingredients that I had on hand. Noreen's recipe calls for Mozzarella and Parmesan cheeses and I didn't have them handy. So I modified the recipe slightly and used Monterey Jack and Cheddar. Also, I added sautéed mushrooms to my sauce, because I wanted to! Here is how it turned out:

My family is still licking their lips! You can find the recipe for this and other great dishes on the blog site: Noreen's Kitchen. Just click here to see the recipe. By the way, with my modifications the supper was just over 500 calories including the salad! Not bad for cheese and beef!! I loved the crunch of the cold salad paired the succulent burger. Also, it was really fun to make. I love cooking and this was just what I needed to make tonight. Thanks, Noreen!!

It was a great Saturday in the neighborhood. I hope you experienced the same thing where you are. Thanks for stopping by. Until next time when I'll likely share more from Nancy's kitchen! Godspeed, Voyagers!!

Days 333 - 339

Me modified via Snapseed!

This is quickly becoming a weekly blog! Not on purpose, mind you, but at the moment, out of necessity. You see, I'm very busy trying to figure myself out! No, I don't have time to waste here, but still, I'm not sure I'm honing in properly on what I want. I choose to see life as simple and also choose to be happy no matter where I am or what I'm experiencing, but life experience has taught me to also make changes or else I won't be here to enjoy more of life!

At 55 years of age, over-weight and a cancer survivor, I don't think my choices about 'lifestyle' have been too smart. I WANT to change that about myself, but I'm struggling. How do I change what needs to be changed and still live my life in an enjoyable way? I built a chart in Numbers to help me start to figure it all out. Here is what the chart looks like:

Click on the chart image to make it bigger!

As you can see, I over-eat, don't exercise, drink too much caffeine and was (I'm stressing here was) shaking salt on food at the table. I've stopped the salt shaking (except on eggs and I don't eat many of these) but the rest I must change. As I look at the short list, it contains things that I must start doing, stop doing and continue doing to be successful. So, I guess I will select three things:

1. Start exercising - Just do it...walk in place inside the house, for Pete's sake!!
2. Stop over-eating - Again, just do it! This may be the hardest thing of all!!
3. Continue avoiding the extra salt - Water follows salt. I don't believe I 'retain' water, but every little bit will help! The less water on me, the more my heart will thank me!

Okay, so all I have to do is exercise 20 minutes every day; stop over-eating -- just STOP it and continue with my improved salt habit. That's it!!

How will I do with this? Can I be successful doing these 3, simple things? Really, a word I used above is important: Success. What does success look like? To me it looks like this:

• I'm exercising, on purpose no less than 20 minutes, every day.
• I'm eating real food, the kind my Great Grandmother would recognize as food, not too much, mostly plants.
• Salt is an afterthought.
• Weight is slowly dropping.
• I feel good.
• I have more stamina.
• I have more energy.

I have less than 30 days until I will have passed an entire year trying to figure myself out, but I'm still here; still kicking and have every intention of doing the three numbered, simple things above and experiencing the 7 bullet points below that. Thanks for checking in on me. With every failure I get a little closer to success. I'm not afraid to fail, I'm just ready to succeed now. I hope you stop back by again soon. Until then, Godspeed, Voyagers!!

Day 327 - 332

This is my Rescue and Recovery Face

Practically a whole week has gone by again. Time just slips through my fingers right now, but I'm enjoying myself for the most part, so I guess I shouldn't mind. I had planned on working from home on Friday of this week, but it didn't actually work out for me the way I'd hoped. Here's my story:

Friday morning, I woke as usual, took my shower but instead of making my breakfast and lunch and driving to work, I went to work in my living room. All it took was for me to sit down with my tea and breakfast and start the process of working, only to find my computer booting up in Rescue and Recovery mode! What the heck!! I spent about 30 minutes trying to get it to work and eventually packed it all up and drove to the office. As soon as I handed the computer to the IT technician I knew the SOB (computer, not technician) would make a liar out of me. Rats!! It booted right up for him!! So, I trotted off to my office and plugged in the computer and decided to work from there. It did do the same thing for me as soon as I plugged it in and the IT guy came in and confirmed that I'm not crazy, but they determined that my external hard drive is going out and that's the problem. I will go buy a new one of those on Monday. I will again attempt to work from home as many days as I can next week. We'll see how it goes. Oh, the trials and tribulations of solving those remote work issues!

On the home front, I'm still working to lower our cost of living around here. I've been reading up on tips for lowering utility costs, food and other necessities of life. We're not big spenders over here, but I'd like to retire with good habits in place, some day, and with as much savings as possible. In my humble opinion, there are four keys to building savings:

1. Know exactly how much money is coming in and going out, at all times.
2. Know what you're spending your money on and why, at all times.
3. Do NOT acquire any debt!
4. Spend less than what is coming in, AT ALL TIMES!!

Regardless of whether you bring home $1,500USD or $15,000USD per month, the principles are the same. Know exactly what the amount is before you spend a cent of it. Don't sign up for classes at the school of credit and spend! If you can't afford something, you can't afford it. I'd love to have a Rolls Royce automobile, but I can't afford it. Would someone lend me the money for it? Maybe, but I STILL cannot afford that car!! Borrowed money will never make you more able to afford things; it just makes you indebted to whomever lent you the money. Be happy with what you have and enjoy finding ways to make life beautiful despite how little money you think you have. Remember, you're not alone. If you're jealous of the wealth of others, study up on how to create more wealth and get off your behind and WORK!

Wow! This posting took a turn down the deep, deep drive of finances. I'm full of advice about finances. If you're interested in learning to be happy with your income and how to live an abundant life no matter what you make, I'll be happy to coach you. Just contact me via comments below!

So, that's it for today. Be sure to check out my new recipe for Lemon Turkey that I posted in my recipe pages. I hope you've had a great week!! Until later when there will be more news from hot and humid Central Texas, Godspeed, Voyagers!!

Days 322 through 326

Welcome to the first of June! In just a short 30 days, we'll be starting our slow decent through the final half of the year. Please stay seated with your seat belts firmly in position, as I believe it's going to be a bumpy ride! **smile**

I love walking through this life, no matter how quickly it seems to pass. Challenges don't wreck my world, but rather help me to appreciate when times are good or things are going well. I'm just as human as the next person and thus I can become jaded and fail to see what great blessings are around me. When those challenging times come, my usual path to success is to:

1. Define the challenge/problem/issue/opportunity (however you like to name it!).
2. Make a list of the options for overcoming/solving/eradicating (or whatever) the issue.
3. Mark the list to identify the 'viable' options.
4. Select the best option and make a plan; including what can go wrong.
5. Work the plan!
6. Count my blessings!!

Here is this week's challenge (#1: define!):

My company wants me to work remotely for at least 2 days per week, in order to facilitate the sharing of one office space by 2 managers (we're growing and private office space is at a premium). I don't have a problem with this, as I can do my work from the moon, as long as there is reliable WI-FI. However, my house is small and I don't have a private place to work where people on conference calls won't be asking me, "Where are you?" Also, I don't want to turn the place where I sleep (my bedroom) into an office. I rest there! So, the challenge is to find a place (or places) where I can work remotely and quietly without interruption.

Next, I need to make a list of the possible options (#2: options!):

1. I could snag a chair at the local Starbucks and work from there as long as I don't have a conference call. (Have you heard the loud music at the local Starbucks lately?)
2. I could go to my local library and use one of their 'private' study rooms (they are on a first come/first served basis). Again, as long as I don't have a call. These rooms are considered 'quiet' rooms.
3. I could park in a nice shady location and just use my car as an office, as long as Wi-Fi is available or I'm doing work that doesn't require Wi-Fi.
4. I can just make a list of all the 'public' places in the immediate area that offer Wi-Fi and move from place to place based on my current whim.
5. I could find someone who would rent me an office by the day as needed.
6. I could turn my closet into an office (I'd need to put a vent in there so I don't bake in the summertime...oh, and power...I'll need power in there)!
7. I could plan some long weekends around my state and work from a hotel room for a day or so and then enjoy the area.
8. I could plan some long weekends in my sister's city and work from a hotel room up there.
9. I could give up my office and take on a space in my companies building that isn't in a private office.
10. I could work at my companies building every day, just only be in my private office 3 of those days per week.
11. I could use my bedroom (since it is the one room where people don't have to be there during the day) and use a temporary table and chair so there isn't a 'permanent' work space there.
12. I could use a combination of options, leaving me with variety and more opportunities to switch things up!

Okay, so that's my list of solutions. Now, it's time to identify which of these are viable! (#3: In/Out!)

1. Don't like this idea...too loud and too many temptations to eat and drink! Out
2. Actually, I've done this and it worked fine. In
3. I've done this also and it worked. In
4. Okay, that would be nice to research and I bet I amaze myself with the options. In
5. Pay for a private space? NO! Out
6. I'm not working in the closet. Out
7. Okay, but it would not be a long-term solution. In
8. See #7. In
9. I don't prefer this solution at all. Out
10. This would work, but I'll need to identify the spaces where I can land for the day in advance. In
11. I wouldn't call this my top option, but it will work. In
12. Yes, I could do this, too. In

Out of 12 solutions being considered, 8 of them are viable. Not bad!! Finally, I need a plan of action to put one of these into play now.

Here is what I will do (#4: The Plan):

The plan is to take Solution #11 and put it into use with the next day I work from home. For now, I'll be doing that on Thursdays and Fridays. Thursday can be a heavy call day for me, but Friday isn't. Also, my company works on different hours in the summertime, so Fridays are already half-days for me, which just means it will be easier for me.

As I work the plan, what kinds of things could go wrong? (You guessed it! Another list is coming your way!!)

1. The Wi-Fi connection at our house can sometimes stinks. That could be a potential problem. (See #6 below.)
2. I could start having trouble sleeping in the room where I work. (I just have to keep an eye out for this one.)
3. My family will be inconvenienced...a little bit. (They will grow up and forget all about it.)
4. I might have to be flexible about where I work in the house at times (i.e. people sick and need to be in bed, Wi-Fi not working well and need to work closer to hub and etc.). (Yes, I can be flexible, especially if I don't have a conference call planned.)

That's all I can think of for now. I've added notes to each one of these so that I can mitigate as much resulting misery as possible. Okay, now work it HV!

So, that's my challenge for the week and the plan for a successful end to the test. Yes, I used the blog this week to solve a problem, but you don't mind! Do you? I hope not!! I'm likely to do this kind of thing, over and over again! That's it for today. I'm off to finish the final load of Sunday laundry and prepare some supper. Until later when I'll share more of life with The HumbleVoyager, Godspeed, Voyagers!!