Carl's Journal

In our family, which is two adults, and a cat that comes and goes, we have this little ritual we observe which for the most part works really well. I organize breakfast and lunch, she makes dinner and bakes cakes etc, and I was the dishes.

At times I can be a little bit of an eco-warrior so we have no dishwasher to lighten the load, I believe if you wash the dishes correctly you can use less water and electricity than a dishwasher, and it helps you stay fit.

So the right way, and I'm not being anal here, is to use the hottest water your hands can stand, those pink kitchen gloves actually allow you to wash with even hotter water - did you know that? Only fill the sink as deep as a mug or tumbler lying on its side, about 3 inches I think.

Make sure you put the detergent in while the sink is filling so it gets a chance to froth up, and I only use eco-friendly biodegradable detergent.

Right, now for the most important part! Stacking the dishes before washing them. Yup, you read that right, stack the dishes before you wash them so that the cleanest dishes and things like spoons or forks get washed first. This is important for hygeine and also makes sure you don't dirty up the water too quickly.

I have a system on our bench-top that works really well and isn't the least bit anal, no sirree, its based on pure Einsteinian logic. See I put all the cutlery together, but since they live in two draws I split them into their two piles, silverwear in one, and cooking implements in the other. The cooking implements like spatulas tend to get dirtier so they get washed last.

Then I have a section for cups and glasses, another section for cereal bowls, regular plates stacked with the biggest at the bottom, then pots and pans, and then food mixer components. Its all very orderly, nicely laid out, and lets me follow my system when I wash the dishes.

Unfortunately the system comes to a crashing halt when someone else stacks the dirty dishes. Yup, the other adult in this household doesn't share my dishwashing logic and just throws things together so clean things become dirty, grrr, and everything needs to be restacked before filling the sink, grrr!

She doesn't see it as a great problem, she says I'm weird, she even uses that 'anal' word to describe my system, grrr, fortunately I've calmed down now, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,...

As a counselor, yes I am, although it might be hard for some of you to believe considering how my online persona can be a tad snarky at times, but anyway, as a counselor I am frequently saddened when I do my Entrecarding or participate in discussion threads and see so many references to people getting divorced and the parties doing very little to reconcile their differences.

It saddens me because in so many cases divorce doesn't need to be the final solution. In fact many couples can reconcile and stay together and live a happy loving marriage even after one has strayed or some other event has occurred. Its not impossible to find common ground again, and in time most things can be forgiven if there is a genuine desire on both sides to make things work.

This is why marriage counseling helps, and since most of the people I come across are in the US, please take a look at that directory. It lists marriage counselors in all 50 states and Canada, and believe it or not, pricing usually isn't that much of a burden compared to the cost of getting a divorce. They even have a list of telephone counselors if that helps.

The wonderful thing about marriage counseling is that two people who used to be in love can first of all learn to understand the other person's reason for feeling detached from the marriage, and this is a good thing if anger is present. Secondly, marriage counseling allows some measure of trust to be rebuilt between husband and wife (or between same sex couples) allowing them to look beyond their own personal hurt and see how their separation affects others.

But most importantly, marriage counseling is about being able to move forward, and even when divorce is still the final outcome, marriage counseling prior to the divorce often allows an amicable divorce, and when children are involved this really does help both parents reconcile their differences so that they can continue to support each other in the raising of their children.

I hope my little rant of frustration is well received by my readers, and you know I'm right, there is far too much hurt on the blogosphere, and I'd love it if I could see just one more blogger who talks about how they and their spouse have managed to stay friends and even fall in love again, instead of becoming enemies.

If you haven't heard already, last night was the final of Eurovision 2008, this year hosted by Serbia, and a great job they pulled off, the stage looked fantastic and they had good crowds watching at the venue which gave the show a great atmosphere.

Shame about the performances though, and how on earth anyone could think Russia deserved to win with their lame excuse of a song I do not know. The guy can't sing, his performance was very formula, and frankly the ice skater dancing around the stage was just distracting, but anyway, obviously wiser heads then mine had the casting vote.

My personal favourites were Norway, Greece, and Armenia, but only one of those made it into the top three which is a shame because they all have the potential to be successful outside of Eurovision.

I was pleased to see that countries like Ireland and Estonia didn't make it into the final with their joke of an entry, but it didn't make much of a difference considering we still had Latvia and their terrible pirate song, or Bosnia with their weird idea of indie rock. Was this ever actually supposed to be a singing and song-writing contest, or has it always been about live stupidity?

Either which way, I won't be watching next year, the best performers get nowhere, and the people who treat the whole thing as a joke get all the votes. Stupidity!

A couple of years ago my partner and I were really seriously into investment property, I think we attended about 4 different seminars while we learned the lingo, before choosing to buy a couple of houses and renovate them which we sold for a profit. For our next property buy we're thinking of holding onto the real estate we buy and putting tenants into them whilst they appreciate in value.

With the terrible uncertainty happening in the US market at present we're thinking that buying a couple of investments in the US might be a great long term investment, especially with the number of bargains that we believe will be available over the next year or two while the US economy recovers from the sub-prime debacle.

Not knowing much about the US property market, we came across Jason Hartman and his podcasts, and I'm waiting on his free CD to be shipped as well, so that we can get a solid grasp of real estate investment in the States from someone who knows the market. Yeah, I know its easy to get hooked on a good sales message, but we already know property and how it works, and Jason is saying all the right things as far we can can judge.

Investing in doer uppers is very different from making a return on leasing, so its important that we make sure we're upon the market before making any moves, it is the only way to protect your money, and we never do anything without fully researching our options.

Here in Spain the market is also a bit slow, but many Spaniards are happy to sit on property until the market goes back up again. Of course some say this may take a long time given the emerging real estate market in Eastern Europe and to a lesser extent in North Africa. So looking to the other side of the Atlantic (which is only a few hours away) seems like it could be worth our while. I'll let you know how if it works out.