Austerity.

I believe I was in seventh grade when I first heard a meaningful conversation that contained the words “austerity budget”. Two bus drivers were talking during a field trip stop; one of the bus drivers was a fiery woman named June Lavezzo. She really was a bit of a spitfire and she also had a heart of gold. She was discussing with another bus driver that a neighboring school district had just voted down the yearly budget for the second time, which meant they were going on “austerity”. No field trips for the students that called themselves the Matadors. I bring this up because “austerity” has been coming up in financial conversations with my husband a lot over the past few months. I see the prices of gas jumping by dozens of cents a day, diesel prices are skyrocketing, and then I see a bag of Doritos marked $8.99 and I can’t help but reflect back on austerity budgets. Normally when we’re storm chasing we’ll stop somewhere for a bite and a brew, but with the rising prices (and idiotic…