Dry goods in the fridge?

[rodentraiser]

Now that we finally got rid of bed bugs here, awhile back there appeared roaches! I think they're coming from up the sink drain and I've only seen them in my cupboard above the sink. I also found one in the bathtub.

I'm beyond exasperated. I had absolutely no uncovered or unsealed food in my cupboard, but I moved everything over to the hutch.

Anyway, I went out this week and bought replacement flour, sugar, etc, because I do that once a year whether I need to or not (now I notice my flour has a USE BY date of next January). I threw out all the old stuff, washed out all the canisters and jars, and filled them up.

Thing is, I still have a lot left over. My canisters are small and I have no idea why I can't find small boxes of brown sugar, etc, these days. At any rate, I have flour, Bisquick, brown sugar, and powdered sugar left over in their bags. And of course, I just found out I ran out of large and small freezer bags. I see another store trip coming up (I forgot buttermilk, anyway).

Because I don't want to leave anything that isn't completely sealed in my cupboard or hutch, I put them all in the fridge. I will put a note on the board downstairs asking if anyone wants the extra, but meantime, is a fridge a good idea or not?

 

[Kayelle]

You are still in your apartment? If they are in your apartment, they are in every other apartment too. Notify the manager. Yes, for right now, put all the dry goods in the refrigerator.

How are your moving plans going?

 

[Aunt Bea]

Check the $tore for small quantities of sugar, flour, etc...

Before you run out and buy storage containers check the recycling bin for some pint and quart jars from spaghetti sauce, salsa, peanut butter, etc...

Wash them, scald them with boiling water, dry and use them to store your dry goods.

Good luck!!!

 

[blissful]

We store grains, beans, dried fruit, pasta, nuts, old fashion rolled oats, in 5 gallon sealed buckets from home improvement stores. We have a dozen of them, we use them for all kinds of things, bringing in tomatoes from the garden, hauling dirt, sauerkraut fermenting. They are easy to move from one place to another so they might come in handy for moving.

 

[taxlady]

If I buy extra flour or some kind of flour I know I won't use up soon, I put it in the freezer. I think putting your extra stuff in the fridge to keep them away from the roaches is a good idea. But, do get management to get rid of those critters ASAP.

 

[Oldvine]

I put all that stuff (except sugar that goes into a gallon jar) in the refrigerator once it's opened. But first it goes into the freezer for a week or so just in case something rode home in the bag... and that has happened.

 

[rodentraiser]

Hmm, well, maybe I'll leave what I have in the fridge and just try to give it away as soon as possible.

Thank you, everyone, for the advice!

You are still in your apartment? If they are in your apartment, they are in every other apartment too. Notify the manager. Yes, for right now, put all the dry goods in the refrigerator.

How are your moving plans going?

Yes, I'm still here, still waiting on the water. *sigh* It'll be a bit yet before I move.

As for the roaches, no one else has complained yet and quite frankly, after having my room torn apart to have them spray for bedbugs, I'd just as soon ignore the roaches, especially since I haven't seen them in a while.

I get so tired of the inspections. I just had one done by the housing department last month, now the county is showing up in June to test all the smoke alarms and stuff, even though the housing authority just did that. So far in the last year, I've been required to be here 6 or more days to allow someone access to my room for checks and testing. If I had a job and had to tell my employer I had to take that much time off for this stuff, I'd be fired.

 

[rodentraiser]

Hmm, well, maybe I'll leave what I have in the fridge and just try to give it away as soon as possible.

You are still in your apartment? If they are in your apartment, they are in every other apartment too. Notify the manager. Yes, for right now, put all the dry goods in the refrigerator.

How are your moving plans going?

Yes, I'm still here, still waiting on the water. *sigh* It'll be a bit yet before I move.

As for the roaches, no one else has complained yet and quite frankly, after having my room torn apart multiple times to have them to check and spray for bedbugs, I'd just as soon ignore the roaches, especially since I haven't seen them in a while.

I get so tired of the inspections. I just had one done by the housing department last month, now the county is showing up in June to test all the smoke alarms and stuff, even though the housing authority just did that. So far in the last year, I've been required to be here 6 or more days to allow someone access to my room for checks and testing. If I had a job and had to tell my employer I had to take that much time off for this stuff, I'd be fired.

 

[Kayelle]

Thinking that inspections are actually a good thing with your subsidized housing RT. I know it's not convenient but no inspections are far worse when you think of how many live in slum lord conditions. Six inspections for health and safety per year doesn't sound unreasonable to me.

 

[Addie]

Thinking that inspections are actually a good thing with your subsidized housing RT. I know it's not convenient but no inspections are far worse when you think of how many live in slum lord conditions. Six inspections for health and safety per year doesn't sound unreasonable to me.

You are right Kayelle. I live in subsidized housing, and I don't mind the inspections at all. Management comes around once a year, and also HUD. Management hates the HUD inspections. And they look to make sure the changes cited at their last inspection were done. They pick which apartments they want to inspect at random. I got them only once in the twelve years I have been here. I got all new blinds thanks to HUD. Roaches were also found in the apartment above me. So management did her apartment along with six other apartments. Mine was one of them, even though I had never seen any. At least management was trying to stay on top of it.

In our lease it states that during inspections, the tenant does not have to be home. The manager has the master key for all the apartments and can enter even if the tenant is not home. But they do have to give a 24 hour notice for inspections. There have been a couple of times when someone has left something in the oven, and smoke was even in the halls. Of course all the alarms went off and we all had to evacuate.

A few years back before I got sick. I hadn't been out of my apartment. No one had seen me. It seems that a rumor had started that I had died in my apartment all alone. So one afternoon, someone went to the Manager and she came up and used her key. I was sound asleep. She woke me up an wanted to know if I was all right. Yeah. I hadn't been seen because it was in the middle of winter and very cold outside. And I don't socialize with the tenants very much. I stay to myself most of the time. But that little event, has now made me let folks see me go down to get my mail, go outside on my scooter, etc.

We also had a mouse problem. Now there are mouse traps in all the trash rooms and along the hallways. Haven't seen any little critters in years.

 

[rodentraiser]

Well, at least it isn't going to be like the bedbug inspection. For that, I have to move al the furniture over so they can lift the bed. That's getting harder and harder for me to do with my back.

 

[Roll_Bones]

You are right Kayelle. I live in subsidized housing, and I don't mind the inspections at all. Management comes around once a year, and also HUD. Management hates the HUD inspections. And they look to make sure the changes cited at their last inspection were done. They pick which apartments they want to inspect at random. I got them only once in the twelve years I have been here. I got all new blinds thanks to HUD. Roaches were also found in the apartment above me. So management did her apartment along with six other apartments. Mine was one of them, even though I had never seen any. At least management was trying to stay on top of it.

In our lease it states that during inspections, the tenant does not have to be home. The manager has the master key for all the apartments and can enter even if the tenant is not home. But they do have to give a 24 hour notice for inspections. There have been a couple of times when someone has left something in the oven, and smoke was even in the halls. Of course all the alarms went off and we all had to evacuate.

A few years back before I got sick. I hadn't been out of my apartment. No one had seen me. It seems that a rumor had started that I had died in my apartment all alone. So one afternoon, someone went to the Manager and she came up and used her key. I was sound asleep. She woke me up an wanted to know if I was all right. Yeah. I hadn't been seen because it was in the middle of winter and very cold outside. And I don't socialize with the tenants very much. I stay to myself most of the time. But that little event, has now made me let folks see me go down to get my mail, go outside on my scooter, etc.

We also had a mouse problem. Now there are mouse traps in all the trash rooms and along the hallways. Haven't seen any little critters in years.

Do they have any issues with you having your two grown sons living with you?
If they work, do they take their earnings into account when setting the rent?

 

[taxlady]

Do they have any issues with you having your two grown sons living with you?
If they work, do they take their earnings into account when setting the rent?

I think it was just the one son. Catch up on that situation here: http://www.discusscooking.com/forums/f26/going-mia-75578-251.html#post1595175 It's a direct link to Addie's reply.

 

[Addie]

Do they have any issues with you having your two grown sons living with you?
If they work, do they take their earnings into account when setting the rent?

No. Only Scott stays with me. They can't by law cause me to consider his income because he is not listed on the lease. They consider him the same as if I had a nurse staying to care for me or a housekeeper to come and do my cleaning. And I have handed them a legal document stating that he is my LEGAL GUARDIAN AND CAREGIVER.

Spike stops by every morning and evening for coffee. He does not live with me. Because Scott's disability Social Security got hacked one time, at 2 a.m. every month he would transfer his whole check to my savings account to keep it separate from my checking account. Management questioned me about that being included into my spending money. The answer was a resounding "No". That was Scott's money he placed there for protection of his account. The only thing he contributed was some months half the rent. They have never taken that into account to set my rent rate.

So many times I will offer Spike cash to pick up milk or some other food item I had run out of. He has always refused the money. He will pay for the item out of his own pocket.

Spike works for a friend who owns a jewelry store. When there are repairs that need to be done, lost stones in a ring to be replaced, etc. Spike runs the items into town to the Jewelry Building and drops them off, waits for the work to be done and then brings it back. He always dresses in his worst torn work clothes. Folks see him get on the elevator in town and back away from him. He looks like a drunk street person. Little do the know what he is carrying in a Market Basket plastic bag.

At one time he had his own construction business. But with eight heart attacks, he now just does small jobs for friends and other people who have been referred to him. If I wanted to build my home from ground up, there isn't a part of construction that he can't handle. You name the need, and he can take care of the problem. He taught his one child, a son, how to construct also. Today he is in theConstruction Union and is always assigned as foreman for the whole site. Including even the tall office buildings going up all over Boston. On weekends his son also does work for friends and referred work from them. All because they know Spike taught him well. Spike always took him to work with him on weekends as a teen to keep him out of trouble. Spike got his son deeply involved in children's sports. As a result, his son has been manager of a kids baseball team for years and President of the League. And his son is also a member of a Semi Pro Baseball team himself when he has the time.

The wife of the jewel store always has a project for Spike to do on weekends. He does the work when he feels up to it.

All my kids did well in their lifetime. My daughter worked for the Welfare Department for years and was promoted to head supervisor. From their they sent her to the Registry of Motor Vehicles headquarters to get them organized. The public was screaming that the office she was sent to was totally inefficient.

Scott for twenty years did carpet installing. Maureen's husband took him under his wing to also keep him out of trouble. He destroyed his knees from kicking in the carpet. From there he went into plumbing as an apprentice. Learned everything quickly and was promoted to supervisor and setting up the calls according to emergency needs.

I worked as a Pro Temp Secretary. Got assigned to so many different type of professions. As a kid in Junior High, I ran the numbers for the Mob, until I got caught. I never revealed any info. They still owe me a favor for keeping my mouth shut. My mother always wondered why I always had cash in my pocket. I kept my mouth shut. Babysitting was always my answer.

She would even ask if I would run to the store for her to buy something she
needed. "Sure, I will pay for it." No questions asked then.