Off until January

No more posts until after the holidays! Merry Christmas, Happy New Year. Happy Hanukkah, Kwaanza or whatever you celebrate. Onward to 2009!

That auto industry bailout

First the banks, now the auto manufacturers. If we bail them out, everything will be all better... right? Isn't that what they're saying? If we don't bail them out, it will hurt the economy?

Shhh... don't tell anyone, but our economy is already hurting. We gave the banks the money they wanted and it didn't help anything. So we give the auto industry the money they want... and what will that do?

It will:

Give the government part ownership of the auto industry.
Open the gates to other industries wanting their share (hear the rumblings about the credit card corporations?).
Cause class rift by taking from the poor (us) and giving to the rich (them). (Think the people won't resent that?)

And will it cure any ills? Well, if we believe them, some workers will get to keep their jobs.

What we can do

I know you're all busy, but take just a moment to watch this short video.

Spirit of service

What can you do?

Here's a start

It takes a lot of time! A lot more because I'm kind of rusty at this, but I did get a few pages up: Christmas!

I wanted to hurry these, but the rest will come a little more slowly. It's fun. Hope to see you there!

Making cleaning brushes

I have a duster on a long handle, with a turn at the bottom so it looks like a hockey stick. The end is covered with lambswool and it was a good duster in its day. Now, bits of lambswool come off in the dust bunnies when I use it. I love it, because it's shaped so I can get under the piano and around the couch legs.

I took a close look at it with the intention of finding a way to fix it, but in the end I found a way to recreate it. I am going to remove what little lambswool is still on it, then tear strips from cotton rags and tie them onto the form. I'll spray them with Endust or something similar and it should work just fine.

I have a little wool yarn left from a knitting project that should work well, too.

But why stop there? You know those brushes they sell to clean the dryer vents? Make your own with a wire hanger and some short rag strips. Or make a brush for very narrow spaces - you know, the ones you can see but can't get to?

I have some after Christmas projects lined up!

P.S. I'm working on the patveretto.com idea. Thanks for your encouragement!

Question for you

I haven't posted here for over a week. With Thanksgiving and now Christmas and some other thoughts on my mind, I just haven't got around to it.

I have a web site - http://www.patveretto.com - and I've been thinking of publishing some articles to it. Some will be from the old About site, others will be new and not all will be about frugal living. I haven't decided yet. It will take a lot of time to get it ready.

So... what do you think? Would it be worth the work? Does anyone want to read it? I'll leave it up to you.