The High Price of Living

I can't believe gas prices. It's sad. Who gets hurt most? Low wage workers who aren't within walking or biking distance of work, which is most of them.

I'm crunched too. I can't walk to work and carry the traps with cats on my back. I don't get out of the house really at all, except for the thrice weekly trapping. I don't shop in Albany. It's too expensive.

I stopped in briefly at Shop n Kart today, hoping, for some reason, they'd dropped their prices to at least affordable levels. Nope. They're four times higher than Winco on many items. One tiny can of cat food goes for .57. Twenty cents more than same can, when high, at Winco. I saw cereal on sale for 2 boxes for $5. When same box is on sale at Winco, it's $1.48, so it's a dollar higher for the same box of cereal. Unbelievable. This is supposedly the affordable grocery store in Albany.

The Grocery Outlet in Corvallis is far better stocked than the one in Albany, too, although I don't buy that much at the Grocery Outlet because pretty much Winco beats them on everything except a few items now and then, and on cheese. If you want inexpensive cheese or wine, go to the Corvallis Grocery Outlet. Sometimes. Sometimes, it also is far higher than other stores.

So I'm virtually trapped at home now, except when trapping or delivering cats to the vet. There is nowhere I would walk to in Albany, for pleasure, usefulness or exercise. Dismal. I sure wish I still lived in Corvallis.

I am still trying to find a rental there. I haven't told my brother this, who owns this place, but it's my big plan to move back and I'm trying hard to find a place. But, I guess I'm picky now. I don't want to live in a drug and drama infested low income apartment complex. I'm done with those, after living in them for 16 years. The Projects. The Benton and Julian Hotels. White trash living at its finest.

I'd live in a trailer in heartbeat, on a small plot of land, but I don't want to live in a trailer park, because you don't own your destiny in such aluminum box plots. You might own a crappy trailer, but the park king and queen, a.k.a. managers, tell you what you can and can't do, and charge a fortune for renting a plot of ground maybe 30 by 30 feet. Then the owner likely as not will sell the property out from under your trailer, leaving you up shit creek. This is happening all over Oregon, most recently in Springfield, with a long standing senior only trailer park.

There is more urgency to my desire to get back to Corvallis with the spike in gas prices since this town isn't friendly to those on foot and does not have affordable groceries or an extensive bus system or core downtown or any nice parks or sense of community anything. But it's hard going to find a place. I knew it would be, but that isn't stopping me from looking.

So mainly I sit at home, and don't drive unless I am working. So my life is right now very limited. But, I still have high hopes of moving out of here. I haven't given up totally. I am sad that my brother will end up stuck with a useless unsellable house. That does make me sad to think about. Maybe he can rent it out to somebody who likes cats, because there is the cat run through the garage. I think that would make this otherwise kind of dull market house a bit of a brighter star in the lines upon lines of houses up for sale in Albany and there are dozens upon dozens.