Maybe Laralee was right

I have a habit of buying cool new neckties every few months. Normally it happens when Kohl’s sends me a postcard in the mail with an offer like “get $10 off your $20 purchase”. That’s a pretty good deal, so I’ll head over to Kohl’s and look at their ties (specifically the Jerry Garcia collection). The ties are usually marked at $40 “retail” but always seem to be on sale for about $20. With my discount, I walk out with a $40 (supposedly) tie for $10. Not bad.

Anyway, a few years ago Laralee told me that I had enough ties, and certainly didn’t need to keep buying more. I protested that in fact a man can never have enough ties, and they were good deals. She persisted.

I wear a dress shirt and tie to seminary every day, so I decided to do an experiment to see how many ties I really have. (Yes, I could’ve counted them, but what’s the fun in that?) I explained to my class that I’d be wearing a different tie every day, and we’d see how long I lasted. So, on the first day of the semester, it began.

After 59 days I wore my last tie: a gem that Dad gave me, and which probably dates back to the late 1970’s (carbon dating was inconclusive). That was just two weeks shy of finishing the entire semester without repeating a tie!

So I had to conclude that Laralee is probably, in fact, correct. I do have too many ties. I was even at Kohl’s the other day, coupon in hand, and looked longingly at a few ties but didn’t buy them– I bought some nice winter socks instead.

Just for fun, I took a picture of myself in my tie each day, after I returned home from teaching. The lighting wasn’t all that great (it was still early) and let’s face it: cell phone cameras aren’t stellar. Many of the photos are dark or blurry, although I think they still show off The Collection pretty well.

First, an animated GIF showing all 59:

ties

And for more detail, the full mosaic:

tie-grid

Now it’s back to the beginning of the rotation…

Living dangerously

Brent was the hero of the office today when he went out to Walmart to buy space heaters for everyone (except Brian, who was strangely resistant to the idea) to solve our heating problem. Sure, we blew a circuit plugging them all in, but eventually sorted it out by snaking extension cords around the office. Now we’re all warm and toasty.

I’m the guy who can’t stand tags and labels on things, so of course I decided to snip the huge warning label off the cord on my heater.

img_20161208_152236

Yeah, that’s me: living dangerously by removing the tag. Woo!

Keepin’ cool

So we bought a new refrigerator the other day. We were at Lowe’s and noticed they had a killer sale on all of their major appliances. By “killer” I mean most of them were about half-price. Our fridge is at least sixteen years old, and although it’s been running like a champ, you never know when it’ll give up the ghost. And, as Kurt pointed out to me, when your fridge dies, you run to the store and take whatever they can deliver in the next few days.

new-fridge

This one is black, which means for the first time in our twenty years of marriage we’ll have a fridge that actually matches our other appliances. It has side-by-side doors and is a little wider and deeper than the old one, so we have more room for food. Interestingly enough, two kids have moved away and another will be leaving soon, so we actually have less food these days. The freezer is a huge drawer in the bottom (bottom freezers are so much better).

So all’s well, and we expect to be happy with this guy for at least sixteen more years. But now we have a problem: what do we do with an old, but perfectly working, refrigerator?

Merry Christmas, Elder Schroeder

We just finished stuffing everything into a big box to ship off to Alex, who’s down in Lima Peru for the second Christmas in a row.

christmas-box

We wrapped a bunch of little gifts for him and his companion, added all kinds of food that he can’t buy in Peru, and jammed in a variety of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups (I even found one of those huge packages which has two half-pound cups.) Unless he gives some away to his companion and the kids and families he visits, he’ll end up with a sugar rush through mid-April.

It’s kind of a bummer not to be with him for Christmas (again), but we’ll have a chance to talk with him for the third time since he left. I know the stuff he’s doing is important and worth it. Merry Christmas, Elder Schroeder.