<$Wednesday, October 31, 2007$>
Happy Halloween!
| We're doing pretty well as far as having a frugal Halloween goes. With all of the health stuff going on I got distracted and totally forgot about trying to put together a costume until it was too late, so that took care of any spending in that department. We don't have to worry about any kids knocking on our door tonight, either, so the only candy we had to buy was to satisfy our own collective sweet tooth. We've got plenty of scary DVDs and popcorn on hand to get us through the night without requiring us to spend a dime. This is probably the most cost-free Halloween I've ever had, but I have no complaints. I'm looking forward to cuddling up to my sweetie on the couch while we munch popcorn and watch some spooky classics in the dark. It's a happy Halloween. I hope yours is, too. If your looking for some free, spooky entertainment to get you through the night, here's a collection of Halloween-related videos and podcasts. Settle in, turn the lights out, grab some candy and enjoy. I love Halloween. Labels: fun |
Product Love: LED Christmas Lights
| As October comes to a close, it's looking less and less likely to happen, but I'm still holding out hope that Husband and I will be in our own place by Christmas. Whether or not our Christmas wish comes true, I want us to aim to have an environmentally-conscious holiday season. There's a lot of talk in the personal finance blogosphere about switching out incandescent lightbulbs to CFLs in order to reduce both energy costs and environmental impact. So it makes sense to also look at alternatives to incandescent Christmas lights. One such alternative is LED Christmas lights, which look just as pretty while using 90% less energy than incandescents. They're safer, too, seeing as they don't get nearly as hot as the old-fashioned variety. Growing up, artificial trees were de rigueur in my family, so one thing I'm definitely looking forward to is the day I have space for a real, live Christmas tree. I love the suggestion in this article, 9 Things You Can Do To Make Your Holidays Greener, to use a live tree that you can re-plant in your yard come spring. It has some other great suggestions, too, some of which I've already been doing for years--more for frugality's sake than that of the planet--like skipping cards or tags and just writing names directly on the package. Here I thought I was just being cheap; turns out I was also reducing waste. I really, really hope we can celebrate the holiday in our very own house this year; but even if we're stuck spending another Christmas in our two-room attic, we can enjoy the challenge of having ourselves a Green Christmas. Labels: disclosure, green, PPP |
<$Monday, October 29, 2007$>
Happy Date-iversary
| Today is the third anniversary of the semi-blind date that formally introduced me to my husband. It's a strange realization... on the one hand, it's like, "Wow, we've known each other three whole years now. That sure went fast." On the other, it's like, "Wow, I can't believe we've only known each other three years. It seems like we've known each other forever." A trippy feeling, that. I wonder if it will still feel this way in thirty. |
<$Monday, October 22, 2007$>
Debt Reduction Milestone
| I'm feeling a lot closer to normal now, but being out of commission so much last week left me with a lot of catching up to do, both online and in 3-D. Mostly in 3-D, actually, which means that the blogs will probably remain relatively quiet for another week. But I'm taking a break long enough to post a quick update on my debt reduction progress. With my most recent payments I managed to knock my largest credit card--which carries the bulk of our consumer debt--to under $4,500. It's now hovering just above $4,400, in fact. I want to challenge myself to knock out that $400 and get it under $4,000 by the end of the year, but I'm going to need to do some thinking about ways to make that happen. I'd need to step up my blogging game here, for one, and my schedule doesn't look like it's going to allow that for a little while yet. I know I've got plenty of stuff at home that I could/should be trying to purge, so maybe I can get off my duff and sell some of it on eBay. Even so, with the holidays looming, it will definitely be a challenge. $400 might not sound like much, but for us, that's quite a lot to come up with in just two months. I think it just might be doable, though. And even if it's not, trying will only result in more progress. Ladies and gentlemen, we have ourselves a goal. Labels: credit cards, goals |
<$Wednesday, October 17, 2007$>
Please Excuse Jean from the Blogosphere
| This blog was signed up for Blog Action Day, which was... er, two days ago. I have a good excuse for not blogging, though. See here for why I missed it. I hope to get back into a regular blogging schedule soon, but probably the rest of this week will be all about catching up. Meanwhile, I'm off to work up a financial plan to deal with the emergency room bills that are sure to arrive soon. Labels: personal |
<$Wednesday, October 10, 2007$>
BP Decathlon
I've been pretty impressed with BP's efforts lately to be more responsible and environmentally conscious. They seem to be honestly committed to the effort to find and develop alternative sources of energy and to promoting environmental awareness. The latest example of such is the BP Solar Decathlon, a semi-annual event hosted by the Department of Energy that pits 20 university teams against each other in the quest to design and build the most livable, efficient and entirely solar-powered house. This year's event takes place in Washing, D.C., starting tomorrow and running through next Friday. If you're in the DC area, it sounds like it could be a lot of fun to stop by and check out. I'll be following updates in the hopes of getting ideas for when we finally have a house of our own—when that happens I'd love for us to go solar-powered as much as possible. I think it's both commendable and a sad commentary on the industry that BP is the only energy company sponsoring this event. It makes me wish BP stations were more widespread and accessible in my part of the country. I'd be happy to give my gas money to them instead of to the greedy oil giants who seem to be parked on every corner here. Labels: disclosure, green, PPP |
The food thing, debt progress, and breathing freely once again
| Wow. I sure didn't mean to go another entire week without posting, but things got kinda hectic around here. The good news is, I've got a lot of overtime coming to me on my next paycheck, which should help us get back on top of things, so YAY! With our emergency savings fully funded again, I'm feeling much better about life, the universe and everything. Including our food spending. Between utilizing coupons and store fliers and a little restraint, I've managed to cut it back to a more respectable level, and Husband and I are finally on the same page about extra treats coming out of our personal allowances once the food fund has run dry. But I've also lightened up a bit about it all. We're foodies. Food = entertainment for us, and it's not like we spend much on other entertainment avenues--Netflix and the extremely occasional, must be seen on a big screen movie outing are pretty much our only non-food (and I count alcohol as part of the food expenses) entertainment. We really don't get out much, especially since the fall semester started. Besides that, Husband has special dietary needs, and we're both health-conscious enough to make many "cheap" food options off-limits. Realizing all of this has helped me feel better about the fact that what we spend on food for just the two of us is more than what some families of four get by on. I think we've figured out a balance between knowing what's worth shelling out for, where we can skimp, and knowing what the rules are for handling the budget that we can both be comfortable with for the time being. In debt news, applying my blog revenue to my credit card via weekly payments is proving a lot more productive at knocking down the debt than just tacking $50 or $100 on to the minimum payment was. My blogs don't really bring in that much on a weekly basis, but it's added up to reduce my debt this last month by about $100 more than it would have been reduced otherwise. So that's a method I'm liking and sticking to. All in all, things are looking up. The financial aid check was a huge help, and after several relatively small paychecks (thanks to short pay periods and a lack of overtime) in a row we've got some larger ones to look forward to again. If we can just be careful with our holiday spending, we ought to start pulling ahead for the rest of the year. After a couple of months of living paycheck-to-paycheck and treading water, it feels great to finally be making some headway again. Labels: credit cards, frugality, money management, personal, spending |
<$Wednesday, October 3, 2007$>
Life Insurance
| *Sponsored Post* Something that's been on my mind lately is life insurance. I have minimal coverage through my employer, but it's nowhere near enough that it won't leave Husband in the lurch if, God forbid, anything should happen to me. And HE'S not covered at all. I might be the primary breadwinner for the time being, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't take a huge financial hit (to say nothing of the emotional hit) if anything terrible happens to him. With his medical history and health problems, though, finding affordable coverage for him could prove difficult. I just got a free quote from eLifePolicy, which is a subsidiary of HSBC Holdings. They don't require a health exam, they offer a wide variety of coverage levels and lengths, and you can get a quote, apply and have your policy activated in a matter of minutes—all with a 30 day money back guarantee if you change your mind. My quote turned up, among a long list of other options, a 10 year, $100,000 policy for only $12/month. At that rate I could afford to cover both of us. I need to discuss it with Husband before I make a decision, but I know it would give me peace of mind to get this unpleasant business off of our financial To Do list. Labels: financial planning |
Happy days are here again.
| I'm feeling better today, thanks mainly to an astute LiveJournaler who pointed out over there that maybe I should cut my pills in half and try taking smaller doses. I like to think I might have thought of that myself if I hadn't been drugged to the gills already, but I'm grateful somebody took me by the virtual hand and pointed out the obvious. So I tried that, and lo, I'm feeling much more myself today. Thank God. The other reason for my chipper mood is that the university finally forked over a check for Husband's financial aid, less tuition and fees, and it's even bigger than we anticipated. So now I can stop fretting about the dwindling of our savings account and pay back our emergency fund in full. AND we can buy a new home computer. And we might even be able to set aside enough for us both to do some clothes shopping which, aside from getting to pick out a suit jacket and a couple of tops for my birthday last spring (thanks, Mom!), neither of us has done in over a year (and that little shopping spree was forced on us by virtue of forgetting to take half of our luggage with us on our honeymoon). Our respective wardrobes are beginning to look a little tattered and worse for wear. In the meantime, I'm dumping the entire amount into our savings so it can be earning interest while we decide how best to budget it. But first, I have to go stick it in my local checking account, which I get to go do right now. Whee! Labels: healthy living, money management, saving+investing, spending |
Network Your Investments
I don't really know that much about investing. I have my work 401K and my high-yield savings account, and that's about it. But then again, a year ago I didn't know much about money management, period. The personal finance blog network and social networking sites like Wesabe helped me to come a long, long way in a relatively short amount of time. Now that same type of support system has reached the world of investing. MyWallSt.net is a social networking site specifically for investors and those interested in getting started. Apart from the backing of an entire social network to advise and guide you, rookie traders like me also have the benefit of a virtual stock market in which to get their feet wet and test their trading skills and knowledge with virtual money before diving into the grown-up pool. I've always been pretty intimidated by the stock market and the whole investing world in general, with traditional avenues of learning tending to cause my eyes to glaze over and my head to hurt from too much information. When I'm ready to move out of simply saving and get serious about making my money work for me, this looks like an ideal way for me to get started, allowing me the opportunity to learn what I'm doing without any actual risk. Labels: investing, money management |
<$Tuesday, October 2, 2007$>
Braaaaaiinszzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
| What is my deal, some of you might be wondering. What is wrong with me that I'm not blogging? WELL FINE, I'll tell you what my deal is. I'm on drugs, that's what. Some backstory: I went to the doctor two Fridays ago, and blah blah hypothyroidism blah blah dopamine levels too low blah blah need to get plenty of sleep so here take this Lexapro to curb your nightmares, said the doctor, and so I am, and... you know how whenever a cartoon like The Simpsons or South Park wants to satirize the medication trend, and they show whacked out kids on Ritalin or Prozac or whatever acting like complacent little zombies? And I've always taken exception to that, because I've had experience being helped by taking Ritalin, and I tend to think that as long as those medications are handled responsibly and taken properly, there's no reason to get all uppity and judgmental about people who need to take them. Except, while I still feel that way, I also feel very like one of those zombie kids, like I'm sleepwalking over here, and it's all I can do to sit upright and keep my eyes open, and I can't really bring myself to care about much else. Hi, I'm a zombie. Please don't blow my head off. This right here is the most writing I've done since I started taking the stuff. Nosir, I don't like it. I don't like it at all. Besides being tired all the time, I also have no imagination or creative energy. I can't picture things in my head the way I used to. It's like there's a well of imagination there, with my novel simmering beneath the surface, but it's frozen over and I can't tap into it. So I sit here and stare into space, and wish I could go lie down. And the whole thing is starting to depress me. I guess common sense would dictate that I stop taking the Lexapro and go back to St. John's Wort. I agreed to the switch mainly because the doc said it would do the same thing as the Wort, only more effectively--which, I haven't had any nightmares since I started taking it, but big deal; the bad dreams weren't nearly as disruptive to my life as this waking fog is turning out to be--and more cheaply, as quality SJW is on the pricey side, and my insurance provides generic prescriptions at no cost (for this reason I've also been kicking around the idea of trading in my ADD supplements for prescription meds), but right now it appears I'd be better off taking nothing than taking Lexapro. However, it can take up to four weeks to fully kick in and be effective. I'm only part-way through week two. So I'm willing to stick it out and give it one more week, to see if this unfortunate side-effect wears off and I start feeling normal again. One week, tops, and then if I still feel like the walking undead, I'm done with the stuff. So bear with me for one more week, folks. I'll try to post some updates here and there in the mean time, but content will remain scant until either the medication starts working properly or I chuck it. Meanwhile, if anybody has any experience with Lexapro or other anti-anxiety meds and is willing to share, I'd love to hear about it in the comments. Don't be scared. I promise not to eat your flesh. I don't have the energy for it. Labels: healthy living |