Cashing in the Jewelry

Momoko and her sister went through her mom's jewelry. There was allegedly one piece that got appraised for $4,000. They needed to find a way to sell the jewelry. Momoko called around. We ended up going to the jewelry store the family has been going to for ages.


The store was far away. We drove there with a bag full of the best jewelry. I said that if they offered $10k, they should sell it immediately without even a second opinion. A lady helped us. She looked through all the jewelry. Most she immediately set aside as worthless.


The jeweler used her eyepiece to get a good look at a couple pieces. Turns out the top item was only worth $250. Another was worth $200, and another maybe $100 to $150. The smaller items were maybe worth $50. In total, the lot was about $500 to $600. This was based on the scrap value of the gold.


They recommended we try to sell the items on Facebook Marketplace. They thought we could get lucky and maybe get upwards of 50% of retail value. However we might have to let buyers bargain us down to 33%. They emphasized that we should conduct the sale at the police station. Yikes.


I did like the Seiko wall clocks they had for sale there. There ran a few hundred dollars each. But they looked really cool.

The Demise of Grannie Kat

Momoko's mother has been in the hospital for a year. She was on a ventilator to breathe. They tried to wean her off, but she could not do without it. In fact, she sometimes had trouble breathing even with the ventilator. This resulted in her feeling like she could not breathe. The doctors declared that they could not cure her. She decided to have them administer her some drugs, and take her off the ventilator. She died hours later.


We had planned to visit her again during spring break. She said she wanted us to come much earlier. So we planed a trip for this month after science fair at work. Grannie Kat did not live that long. We decided to go forward with the trip to visit Momoko's father. I got one day off work for travel. We left for the airport at 5am.


The airline steward said there would be some bumps on the plane ascent. I learned that was code word for rough turbulence ahead. After a treacherous 5 to 10 minute ride, the weather and flight calmed down. I tried a new rental car company this time. Inspected the car thoroughly and found prior damage that I made sure to report. I am now pondering buying myself a new car to leave at Momoko's dad's so I don't have to spend all this money renting cars.

Super Bowl 53

Momoko, Kit Kat, and I went to get some Hibachi to go for lunch today. Little Kat was too poor from buying Korean food all weekend. Kit Kat tried the bento box. Momoko and I opted for the Hibachi. Normally we just eat snacks for the Super Bowl. However Little Kat decided he was cooking us spaghetti for dinner.

During the game, Kit Kat baked some pepperoni and sausage pizza rolls. She also baked some jalapeno poppers. There were some small salami slices, as well as an assortment of cheese slices. We did not even get into the different salsa and chip varieties we bought. Probably due to the full dinner.

This was a boring football game until the forth quarter. Not much scoring by either the Rams or Patriots. Half time show was decent due to many popular Maroon 5 songs. Little Kat was unhappy that there was not more Sponge Bob songs.

Commercials were drab this year. None really stood. out.

Buying Heavy Duty Gloves

I have been clearing the leaves from the property. Put another 25 bags of leaves on the curb yesterday. The county came and picked them up this morning. I use cheap heavy duty gloves to pick up the leaves. Sometimes they are wet and/or cold. The heavy gloves really help.

My current heavy pair of gloves has holes in them. That's okay. They are cheap gloves that cost around two bucks each. I figured I would go to the store and buy some more. There was a bunch of medium sized gloves available. They were too small. They were also pricey at $4 per pair.

I found two pairs of large gloves just sitting on top of the glove rack. No sticker or pricing on them. I decided to take them both. The cashier could not find a barcode. He searched through the system and said it looked like they were $12 per pair. Oh hell no. These are the cheapest gloves they had.

I told the cashier that the medium sized ones were $4 each. Even that was double the normal price. But I figured they were worth at least $4 per pair to me. But not a whopping $12 per pair. For that I could have got some more fancy gloves easily. The guy went to the display and confirmed that these style gloves are currently $4. So that's what I paid.

Since I got two pair, I should be good in the yard through spring/summer.

Leaves Frozen to the Ground

I have long since collected all the leaves in the yard. But that is just the fenced-in portion of our property. Then I go rake the leaves on the hill in our back yard. It is a somewhat steep incline down to the creek at the end of our property. I save this chore for last. Can't just run the lawn mower over these leaves. The hill is just too steep.

I had made a dent in this task. Then I went out after the snow had melted. Turns out it was so cold that the leaves stuck to the ground. I wrestled some free with the rake. It was tough work. The high temperature for the day was 20 degrees. My ears were cold even though I wore a hood. My legs were frozen through my pants too.

The next day was a bit better. Some leaves still stuck. But I could rake them up a bit easier. Then on the third day all was well. I actually got a bit hot with my lumberman plaid jacket on. Unfortunately I only had a little time at lunch due to all my meeting at work. I think this third collection will have to do for the week. Tomorrow it is scheduled to rain.

I am also planning to go meet my buddy for lunch tomorrow. That usually takes a couple hours total. No time left over to rake leaves. I was happy this past week where the yard collections team came and hauled away 25+ bags from the curb. I also had a couple trash cans filled with tree branches that they took. This is our tax dollars hard at work.

Secure Login

I have to log into some payroll system to see my pay stub from work. I print it out each pay period. Like to have a hard copy of it. Some time ago, the company set up some security. I had to use this little device that had a changing number on it. It served as my password to log into the payroll system.

Well, my device expired last year. I got some emails about that. Was supposed to sign up for a new type of password generator. I went through the motions. Said I wanted to access the site from my Windows computer. Apparently Windows was not supported.

I asked for a new device. Never got one. So I was stuck. I called my company. They told me I had to download an app for my phone. Well I don't want to access the site from my phone. I want to access it from my computer. Apparently a new app serves the purpose of the old device.

Tried to download the app. My iPhone has too old of an iOS to run the app. Tried to upgrade the iPhone one generation forward in iOS. Did not work. Tried to jump two generations forward. Did not work either. I need this access. So I had to download the latest iOS.

Now I can generate the password to get into payroll. But there are all these weird changes in the iPhone that bug me. Maybe I should have asked my company to provide a work iPhone for this purpose.

True Vacation

Momoko and I went to visit her mom and dad for Christmas and New Years. We decided to make this trip a true vacation. We had to catch up on a lot of movies. Here is what we saw in the theater:

• Aquaman
• Fantastic Beasts the Crimes of Grindenwald
• Spiderman Into the Spiderverse
• Bumble Bee
• Mortal Engines

We also watched a bunch of movies at home:

• The Happy Time Murders
• Sorry to Bother You
• White Boy Rick
• Replicas

I caught a few films on Netflix too:

• Samson
• David and Goliath

Momoko's dad added another Amazon Echo to the house. Trouble getting it to recognize devices and understand commands all the time. And that is before the power went out and it got hosed.