Living w/a Scavenger

[izeveryboyin]

I have always known my significant other to be a bit of a scavenger, but, b/c I didn't live with him initially, I didn't really understand just what that meant. What it meant was giant crap paintings found outside old buildings, broken down, rickety tables, picked up from alleys, useless, non-working household appliances from friends, and a bunch of hair-brained ideas that almost always end up being shit. Now that we are about to have our first (and no doubt last) baby, his habit becomes more and more upsetting. For instance he suggested we get the baby's carseat off craiglist 2nd hand. You would really entrust the safety of your first born child to a device that is pre-owned, with no warranty, and no credible way of telling how many times some other baby has spit, pissed and pooped in it? How? Why? He then suggested we look at a tummy-time playpen someone was giving away for free. Have my child crawling around on a germ-infested play-pen, that has also probably been pissed, spit and pooped on and immeasurable amount of times, and is no doubt defective in some way given that it's free? How? WHY?! He keeps saying that to buy things like that brand new instead of second hand would just mean we would be wasting money that could be used for other things. Like what? What is more important than your child?! He can go sping 550 bucks on a new amp for his guitar a mere 2 months before his baby is due, but he doesn't want to spring a hundred bucks on a highchair? How nuts is that? Our apartment is pretty shabbily furnished. One small loveseat from my old apartment, a busted table and two computer desks. My mom offered us her living room furniture b/c she is getting an all new set. The furniture is about a year old, still looks brand new, and it didn't come from a fucking alley. "No." He says. "I'm going to get a futon b/c I can take it apart and fit it in my car and just carry the pieces upstairs. We can't do that with your mom's furniture." I tell him my mother has some guys who have already agreed to help her bring the furniture to the house. All we have to do is be here to recieve it. "It might not fit through the doorway." You were just raving and jabbering about not spending too much money but you'd rather go out and blow a 100 bucks on some crap-ass futon that I'll have to stare at in disgust every day than a nice, full set of furniture for free that isn't infested with fleas and disease like all the other shit you've brought in from the alley? I mean, am I just being picky like he thinks I am or am I making some sense? B/c honestly I just don't understand his reasoning at all. It makes absolutely no sense to me. The unfortunate thing is that this is becoming an argument much bigger than it needs to be b/c I have held my tongue and watched him bring in all manner of useless junk for so long that now I have exploded. He seemed to be pretty offended with me a couple days ago when we got a package of baby stuff from his mother. In it she had packed some blankets and a few stuffed animals and also some onesies. At least four of the onesies had poop, pee or spit up stains. It was pretty much the last straw b/c I was disgusted and said I was throwing them out. I mean who sends someone poopy onesies for a baby? How unsanitary. Sorry. I know this is turning into a book but I had to rant and try to relate the whole story. If I'm being a prick, I need someone other than him to tell me, b/c this is becoming a major issue and I don't need to add it to my lists of worries what with impending motherhood and all that. So gimme feedback, people. Brutal honesty.

--k

[Lightning Rod]

I've lived with a scavenger before. She is my sister.
She collects antiques and is a lighting specialist and is constantly building lamps out of the things that she has scavenged. I call her a black-belt dumpster diver.
a few months ago she sent me a Yamaha flute.
she had bought it at a garage sale for three bucks
the flute is worth 800 dollars (of course it needs three hundred dollars worth of work)
one man's trash is another man's treasure
one man's ceiling is another man's floor

[Totenkopf]

Spray everything down with lysol, including him. Have him sell his g-tar gear and give you the proceeds. Make friends with the Doc. Put a thug on his mama. Pray, to the gonzo gawds of your choice.

[Doreen Peri]

Brutal honesty .... sounds like yer guy is a control freak. He wants things his way or no way at all.

Who cares if he doesn't want the furniture! Accept the gift from your mom. You deserve some nice furniture.

I lived with a scavenger for 9 years. My marriage split up in 2000. It's now 2007 and I STILL have not gotten rid of all his crap. I had to pay people to lug out all the crap he had stored in the attic. I had to pay people to take away all the junk he had piled up on the side of the house. But the shed in the back is still packed with useless pieces of wood, broken machinery, and more... All stuff he planned on doing something productive with but never did. I know about the pack-rat scene. I hated it.

Who's on the lease? You or him or both of you? If it's both of you, he has some say about what he brings in the apartment but he needs his own room to pile up all his junk. Who needs junk strewn through your nice place which will soon have some lovely furniture in it.

About the used baby stuff, well after having 2, I realized the value of used stuff because new is expensive! But I totally agree... new is WAY better if it's possible! You will probably receive baby gifts and this will help! NEW baby gifts! At the same time, if someone offers you a free used high-chair or a free used play pen, take it! You can always recover the seat, get a new liner for the play pen. Onesies clothes which aren't clean should be out! Used doesn't need to mean stained and soiled. If the items are as good as new but are not stained, then be grateful they are being given to you. If they're soiled, toss 'em. Give them to Good Will or something. I completely agree with you about getting a brand new car seat! They constantly improve car seats and make them safer.

About the new amp but refusal to buy something new for the baby, well, yer guy doesn't have his priorities straight.

Also, if you are already arguing about money issues, you will have a bit of a difficult situation through the years. I suggest financial counseling. I'm sure your state or county offers free courses or counselors to help new couples learn about how to best manage their money. Just an idea.

You asked for honesty and these are my honest opinions based on your post. I do realize that these situations are not at all black & white. They can be complicated.

Tell yer guy to get a few gigs playing music somewhere to justify the cost of the new equipment and take the money he makes at the gig to buy a new car seat.

Much love to you. Hang in there.

[diesel dyke]

I love scavenging
I haunt thrift shops

I hate couches
Everytime I get a couch someone winds up living on it. My last couch person was a musician, he set the record 18 months.
What do you call a musician that broke up with his girlfriend?
Homeless.


The $100 futons last about a week then they are trash.
You should grab that furniture from your mom



The car seat should be new, because the safety features have evolved. But maybe not the latest models cause it is good to check for recalls
The high chair and crib I don't know.


What are his redeeming qualities?
What is his music like?

Joe Strummer "Redemption Song"
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I been trying to figure out what to get for your daughter
My mom was big on sterling silver baby spoons for newborns
She used to buy them in Mexico for a $1.50
I wonder what they cost now.
Nothing to argue about
it is got to be your way
on that subject
at least.

he can be boss in bed
jt

[izeveryboyin]

LRod, there's one in every family. At least she made cool stuff with her scaveneged items. I'm just surrounded by a house full of crap based on nutty ideas that will probably never come to fruition.

D, I appreciate your honesty. And I couldn't love you more. We are both on the lease, but since i left my job, he's been footing the bills and rent for the most part, so I haven't felt comfortable telling him what not to bring into the house. Now it's starting to get on my nerves though. Give and inch and they take a mile. But with the baby stuff it's not the fact that it's 2nd hand that bothers me so much as the fact that I don't know where it's coming from. Anything that family or friends give me I keep (excluding, of course, the shit-stained onesies) but I just wouldn't feel comfortable with my baby having a bunch of used stuff that came from God knows where infested with God knows what. Just a thing I have. Nate does play music pretty much every day and gets paid for it, but the thing is, he already had an amp that worked fine, it was perhaps a little older, but still in perfect working condition. And it's not the fact that he bought the amp so much as the fact that he can spend money for brand new things for himself, and not for his first child. I am getting REALLY pissed off by that. But maybe we should take your advice on the financial counseling. Could be that we could use a subjective outside view to our financial sitch. I'll bring it up to him.

DD, I can't say I've ever, or will ever play host to someone for more than 2 days. I just don't like people that much. And I especially don't like it when someone hogs the couch. lol. His redeeming qualities... uhm.. he has very pretty eyes. LOL. His music is a sorta like zappa meets jeff buckley meets beck meets coldplay meets the doors. That's the best I can explain it. Give my daughter a picture you paint in crayola watercolors, and make sure it's pretty.

tot, I might take you advice... especially the bit about putting a thug on his mother. lol.

--k

[stilltrucking]

The idea of living with a woman again gives me the he be gee bees
My sister comes over and rarranges stuff in my kitchen
It is her right as a woman
Her nesting instincts I suppose
Later I have to look for everything.
I am old and stuck in my ways

he sounds young and niavie
I don't know if he is a control freak.
But I do remember him trying to talk you into going to NY city so he could be discovered.









My musician friend that lived on my counch succumb to an occupational hazard of musicians. Alcohol.

A sweet guy when sober and a mean drunk
May he rest in peace.
Everyonce in a while he would pick up his old Martin and play a tune.
Almost made it worth while.

It started out as an over night stay that kept getting extended another week, another month, another Christmas...

But I could not help him, I finally realized I was enabling him. He did best when he was living in a mission, he maintained sobriety for over a year.

Such a sad story, he had a rich girlfreind, loved him madly, she moved away and asked him to move with her. She was going to grad school. He turned her down. Proablably because he felt unworthy. But he had no problem mooching off of me.

I don't hate people
They just make me sad
I watch the Jerry Springer show just a few seconds at a time is all I can stand. It is not the freaks that make sad, it is the smirks on the face of the audience.

I will be working on that picture.
I appreciate your cyber pal friendship

[Doreen Peri]

Hey, just for the record, I didn't mean to say anything against your b/f. I don't know him. I was just replying to your post. Maybe he's not a controlling person. Maybe it was just a memory of mine from my ex who was a horder and tried to control me. Beats me. I'm no psychoanalyst. I'm psycho sometimes, yeah, and I'm anal sometimes but no pschoanalyst. (misspelling intentional for pun purposes)

[stilltrucking]

This is all good news to me izzy
compared to how it was the last time you wrote

the fact that you and him are back together again.
makes me feel better

I hope you and him work it out
I really do

[izeveryboyin]

D, you ain't said nothin I ain't already said before a million times. control freak might not be a bad term for him. In fact I reckon it's pretty spot on. I came in the house a few minutes ago to a vast array of hideous paintings stuck up on the walls. It never ends.

ST, you have my friendship now and forever. I don't know how long I'll be with Nate. Maybe for another month, maybe for another year, maybe for a decade. That all depends on his ability to compromise. It seems like I have forced myself into a corner where I am the only one compromising b/c I feel almost obligated to do so given that I can't help on any of the bills really. Dunno. We'll see how this all plays out.

Thanks for your suppost at any rate both of yous. As I said to D, I couldn't love you more.

--k

[izeveryboyin]

D, you ain't said nothin I ain't already said before a million times. control freak might not be a bad term for him. In fact I reckon it's pretty spot on. I came in the house a few minutes ago to a vast array of hideous paintings stuck up on the walls. It never ends.

ST, you have my friendship now and forever. I don't know how long I'll be with Nate. Maybe for another month, maybe for another year, maybe for a decade. That all depends on his ability to compromise. It seems like I have forced myself into a corner where I am the only one compromising b/c I feel almost obligated to do so given that I can't help on any of the bills really. Dunno. We'll see how this all plays out.

Thanks for your support at any rate both of yous. As I said to D, I couldn't love you more.

--k

[e_dog]

you cannot live your life by giving in to his bullshit just 'cause he's paying the bills. that's no relationship but ownership.

The Woman rules the house. Period.

[stilltrucking]

ten four on the cyber pals for ever izzy
like I was saying to that crackerhead the flaming ace
friendship means being able to say any tom fool thing to each other and still remain friends.

With that in mind I can't wait until you get better
I mean I am trying to keep it light cause you stressed enough I am sure.

with that in mind I think you might appreciate this post from litkicks by "jenninot"

The AC/DC Double Dong (Content) My first post

Passing a dildo to my mother between my knees wasn’t exactly what I had in mind four days over the due date of my first daughter. A neighbor invited me to a lingerie party and I figured there would be black stockings, massage oils, cheap polyester negligees and lacy crotch-less panties. My mother arrived two weeks earlier to be present for the birth, but the days accumulated without so much as a contraction. The party, located only a few blocks away, gave me an excuse to walk further than the refrigerator or bathroom. I invited my mother, maybe it would take her mind off asking me every five minutes, “Have you had a contraction? Do you feel anything?”

read more here
http://www.litkicks.com/BeatPages/msgAr ... &parent=-1

[Doreen Peri]

I don't get it. What's that story have to do with the topic of this thread, 'truckin? Just curious. I don't see the connection.

[izeveryboyin]

e, if only it were so. If only it were so. I don't rule any part of this house except myself... and maybe the dishes. LOL. And it seems like that's not going to change any time soon.

ST, Well maybe what I need is a little bit of something to egg me on. I'm getting pretty bored w/just arguing w/my BF all the time. For the most part it's just the same shit said in a different way and I could use a fresh bit of conversation. How bout another nigger and jew battle? LOL.

D, I'm not really sure how the sotry connects either, buit has that ever stopped ST? Doubt it.

--k