Dammit!!

The goal my husband & I have right now is to SAVE money. Mainly because when we move, I will be without a job for a few weeks while I job hunt down in SA. So we're trying to SAVE money.

One problem that we have to deal with on our house is some of our windows are crappy. It's our own stupid fault. Actually, it's the PRIOR homeowner's stupid fault but we're the ones that got screwed with it, and we didn't deal with it immediately like we should have. We've got those casement windows, which let me tell you now - RUN AWAY from houses with casement windows. Oh sure, they look pretty and all that, but they are expensive as HELL to repair. We have 17 windows on the front of our house. All casements. They cost anywere from $1000 to $1200 to repair. Each. You do the math. It' hurts my stomach when I do the math.

So we thought we'd change them out. To vinyl windows, with fake wood trim. Want the quote? Sure you do!! $14k. BUT !!! The salesman said he would do it for us for $10K. AND not only that but if we called him back in 30 minutes with our decision, he lower the price yet again to $9500.

I hate high-pressure salesmen.

But we turned him down. So sorry. We're going to just replace the ones that are in super sorry shape. Prolly spend about $5000. If the prospective home-buyer wants a window allowance for anything other than that he/she can bite me and deal with it themselves.

But see, I was on my way to Lowe's to check out the cost of ordering said windows. I had the car loaded up with kids and got to a stoplight. Hit the brakes and.......GRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIND.

Ethan started yelling that there was a monster growling at him, which set Avery off into an orbit of freaked out that would have launched her out the window if she hadn't have been strapped into her car seat. Ashton was afraid we were going to blow up, and I was pissed off cause that grinding noise sounded a lot like money leaving my ass in a most unpleasant manner.

So we bypassed Lowe's and hobbled into a brake store.

I think they saw me coming. I HATE IT WHEN I GET TAKEN ADVANTAGE OF!! Stupid brake people tried to charge me $750 to replace all my rotors, brake pads, flush the brake system and I think replace the brake lines with a diamond studded gold rope. They were very surprised when I insisted on seeing my brakes.

I got brought out to the shop area and proceeded to show me all sorts of metal stuff and thingamabobs and tell me how crappy they are.

I proceeded to lie through my teeth. "Hey. Those look repairable to me. I think you can just slap a new pad on there and it will be just fine." "Well, uh ma'am... see these are to the eighty-thousandth degree thickness and they need to be replaced.... that costs" "Well - so show me all of them..." And do you know what? Apparently , they thought I knew what I was talking about, because the shop manager did a "double look" at the quote and said, "Hey...some of this isn't necessary...." and started taking items off. Either that or I pissed them off with all my nosiness and they are HOPING that I get in an accident... so they lowered the price to $359.

Still hurts.

You know what? I need some money to show up in the mail right about now... or maybe I should buy a lottery ticket.