"One should never forbid what one lacks the power to prevent." - Napoleon Bonaparte

That quote up there makes good wisdom for parents. But there's another dimension I learned from my dad and that we used when the boys were young. When one of us - usually my sister - would say "you can't make me" dad's response was, "You're right, I can't make you do it, but I can sure make you wish you had."

Because of my extended visit with the pacemaker guy we were late for our Thursday dinner date, getting home around 8:00. I'm usually in bed by 9:00 but had some tasks to get done and then sat down for a few minutes, so it was past my bedtime when Pam said, "I smell gas." I didn't, but went out to the garage to check things out. The lines on either side of the fuel pump and up by the carb were all dry, but out there I could smell it, too. More exploration.

Soon I discovered the source of the smell, a steady dripping from under the cab. The fuel tank, located behind the seat, has a steel line going down through the floor, through brass fittings and then through a steel line up to the engine compartment. There is a 12" section of rubber fuel line where it has to make a tricky curve. Those brass fittings were leaking at an increasing rate even as I looked at them.

Question: how does one deal with a fuel leak when there's about 5 gallons of gas in the tank and you only have a 2 gallon gas can? It took me awhile to figure that one out, but an hour later I had most of the gas transferred to the Dodge and what was on the garage floor cleaned up.

Two weird things. First, it wasn't leaking an hour earlier when we came into the house through the garage. Second, I have no idea why that fitting started to leak or why it leaked. I took the fittings into NAPA and he didn't either. But it won't happen again; I've replaced that whole section of line with rubber fuel hose and two very tight clamps. Done!

It's likely going to be awhile before we can build our tiny house. In the meantime, beginning in November, we'll live in that single wide that's 840 sq. ft. That makes it 500 sq. ft. bigger than our house, so we'll have to do some downsizing, but the goal is to take advantage of this step to be fully prepared for the ultimate target. We like downsizing for lots of reasons, including - maybe especially - the financial motivation. On a slim budget like we'll be working with having less house and less stuff means less cost. But there's also a principle involved that bears in large part on biblical virtues like simplicity and stewardship.

I read an article a Facebook friend posted that lists 21 surprising facts about American consumption. Here's a few that I thought especially striking:

• one in ten Americans rents off-site storage, the fastest growing segment of the commercial real estate market over the past four decades.
• The U.S. has over 50,000 storage facilities with enough space for every man, woman, and child in the country to stand under a storage unit roof and have 7.3 sq. ft. of space.
• This despite the fact the average American home has tripled in size over the last 50 years.
• 25% of Americans with a two car garage can't park a car in it. 32% can only park one car there.
• The average 10-year old has 238 toys but only plays with 12 daily.
• The average American family spends $1,700 per year on clothes.
• Americans spend more on jewelry, shoes, and watches ($100 billion) than on higher education.
• Americans spend $1.2 trillion every year on non-essential goods. That is, stuff they don't need.

Downsizing, because less is more.