I-78 Commute's Financial Ramblings

Whoo hoo! Sold an item via Buy It Now for $27.98 (DVD Box Set) and I have two more items with bids that will sell today so I'll get to add them later.

Adding another sale for $103.02 (yippie!)

Adding one more for today for $61.99.

For now:
$808.69
+$27.98
+103.02
+$61.99
-------
$1001.68 total for June!

Ouch! Freakin Card 2 hit me with a $229 finance charge on Friday. I guess they don't want me to forget the importance of throwing money out the window. So I have a minimum payment of $620 due July 13th on Card 2. I expect out of all three cards in July a total minimum payment of about $1750. Not that I like paying minimums but I have been on the top 2 balances (well usually Card 1 is a min payment and I pay a couple of dollars over Card 2) so I can throw as much extra dough at Card 3 to get it eliminated as fast as possible. It works out that in balance order the interest rates are also lowest to highest so not only am I paying down the smallest balance but I'm paying down the highest interest rate at the same time. That always helps. Last month I paid over $6000 off of Card 3 to get it down to its current spot so I have been making some headway. We'll just have to keep on keepin' on with these three gremlins.

Here's the updated totals:
Debt tracker 06/16/08
Card 1: $43514.30 (8.99%)
Card 2: $31032.06 (9.99%)
Card 3: $20705.37 (11.24%)

I had found out on Friday night that I will be getting a bonus of $1506 (post-tax) on July 1st for performance. My anniversary with the company is July 2nd so I'm going to be due for a review and raise sometime in July as well. Last week I discussed an occupational review of my salary and asked for an increase in my pay to reflect my current worth based on skill set, experience and regional area and my boss seemed to be all for it so we'll see if the powers that be decide to grant me my asking price.

The wife and daughter went shopping for Hawaii clothes yesterday and spent about $287. It seems everything for summer is on clearance so they bought clothes for all four of us and did really well. I told her I wasn't worried about it because we do have a lot of extra income coming in right now and I feel a lot better about this trip than I did a couple of months ago. The main thing is she is paying cash for everything and we are not accumulating any additional debt on the credit cards (other than interest charges...dagnabit!)

Well I get to wake up to two Ebay sales for a combined total of $234.25! Though on the second item I listed (video game) I had advertised free shipping and for some reason had $4.99 in there and the buyer did pay the Buy It Now price with the shipping so I promptly emailed him and let him know I was refunding the $4.99 (it's not a lot but it's the principle of the thing.)

So the $234.25 -$4.99 = $229.26 which for me is a great number. I have a total of 11 items listed and more than half of them have bids so we are going to be adding to this number before it's all said and done.

Here is the added Monday $:

$579.43
+229.26
$808.69 so far for June!

First off Happy Father's Day to the other Dad's out there. It's going to be a good time to hang out with the family and get outside (weather permitting but we are really HOT in PA right now) this weekend.

I have a couple of goals for this weekend. The first one is to get more stuff listed on Ebay to sell to continue to generate some extra income and throw it into our savings for this Hawaii trip on August. I still have a lot of stuff to sell and I've been doing a little at a time but I think I'd like to get a few more items up there.

The second one is to sit down with the family and try to plan out the entire vacation. I want to try to plan the activities and meals as much as possible and hopefully get some kind of an idea of what it's actually going to cost. If anyone has been there and has any advice for me I would much appreciate it. We're staying on the big island on the Kona coast and I did get a copy of the Hawaii Entertainment book which is full of nothing but coupons and discounts so I'm excited to actually go through that and pick out things to do. I've also been internet crazy trying to find deals so any advice there would be great too. I appreciate the help!

Sold some baseball tickets on Stubhub today for $181.05 so technically it's not Ebay money but it is extra income that we can desperately use!

Whoo hoo! I'll still add it to the Ebay tracker so that will put us at:

$398.38
+181.05
$579.43 so far for June!

Yippie!

Well here's a great bit of news. My wife got a call from our accountant since we have to pay estimated taxes on Friday. Due to the nature of the business we have to pay taxes in a few different states (PA, NJ, DE, MD) as well as Federal estimates but the company always deposits the amount of taxes we're paying to cover the tax bill since we have part ownership in the company. We've been told by our accountant that thanks to the tax structure we will be getting an additional $2159 back that we get to keep! We will also get the $2159 back every time we pay estimates this year so to us it's like getting another 1/2 paycheck every 3 months. It will be deposited into our checking account on Friday (yay!)

My plan is to stock it away for Hawaii with the $3301 I already have put away and that will give me $5460 to have stockpiled for the vacation in August. I think after we get back I can lump sum anything I've got left into a payment on the debt tracker but this gives us a lot of elbow room for the trip (and the ability to pay cash for everything and not have to worry about adding to our debt.)

I should add that I am excited about the money but it's partly due to the fact that we're not making as much money as we did last year as a company. I'd much rather have retained earnings checks but I'll take what I can get at this point.

I have a meeting with my boss today to state my case for an occupational raise (I'm hoping for an increase so my salary is more in line with my experience and skill set.) Hopefully everything goes well!

OK well here it is...another payday! Right around $3950 showed up in the checking account today (that's what the base salaries bring every other Weds) so here's how I've allocated it so far.

$700 - Card 1 min payment (It was a conso loan that got rolled into a cc with a fixed rate for the life of the balance.)

$300 - Cash. For anyone not familiar with how we try to do this we take $300 out and the wife goes and buys groceries first. Whatever is left is our entertainment/clothes budget for the two of us for the week (we have been trying to stretch this to our one w/d every other week and it is definately possible. She is a great frugal grocery shopper and we definately don't starve!)

$158 - Electric (could be lower...we have to cool a 3200 sq ft house with a 17 year old and a 14 year old crying about how hot or cold it is...much like the wife and I.)

$161 - Cable (Yeah...it's really overkill but whenever I try to cut cable down I get disgruntled household members so I live with it. Thankfully the company pays our internet and local/regional phone bills.)

$70 - Kids (My 17 year old daughter has a checking account and my 14 year old son has a savings account. We're teaching them how money works and they go to the ATM and balance their accounts and reconcile the numbers with Dad. They make a base pay of $25/wk paid bi-weekly but if they fail to do a chore or leave a mess and don't clean up after themselves they get fined (usually $10 after a fee free warning.) They also get rewards for not getting fined for a whole week, a whole month, and they will get a big reward if they can go all summer without getting fined. Just a fun way for us to motivate our kids to be more responsible!)
They would've gotten $100 but failed to return a couple of movies and ended up paying $15/ea for them.

$140 - Maids (They come twice a month though they only really need to come once a month IMO. Try telling my wife that and then dodge the flying object coming at you...another one I live with for peace and harmony.)

$120 - Wife's hair (another luxury but she goes every other month and usually pays less but needs conditioner and some other stuff I don't know anything about. I let her have this as well.)

So that's all that's really "due" this pay period. This means I have $2301 to throw at my debt. Here's a tough thing though. Part of that ridiculous amount of debt you saw in the MS Money post is an already paid for Hawaiian vacation we're taking in August. House, Auto and Flights are all paid for up front and are non-refundable (well the Auto is but that's not really a big deal compared to the flights and the condo we rented.) I'm thinking of putting a good chunk of that money in one of my savings accounts (the trip is in Mid-August) so we can pay for the expenses of this trip with cash. Though I also thought of allocating $1000 towards the vacation fund and the rest on debt. I'm really torn as to what to do so if you have any suggestions I'm all ears. I already have $1000 saved to this point.

OK so we got paid today and I am throwing the minimum payment at the largest debt ($700) for June. The other two don't have a payment due for another month so after paying some utilities I am sitting at a little over $2400 to play with. But for now I'll do the standard update:

Debt tracker 06/11/08
Card 1: $43514.30 (8.99%)
Card 2: $30795.25 (9.99%)
Card 3: $20705.37 (11.24%)

I can't WAIT to have another card paid off but it seems like forever. Tom Petty was right: "The waiting is the hardest part!"

The old desktop I listed yesterday sold with the Buy It Now option so it's already on its way! After fees and everything I netted $125.92 which is already on its way to the checking account.

So the update:

$272.46
+125.92

$398.38 this month! Two more items went up for listing today as well so hopefully I can continue to make a little extra dough here.

Getting paid every other Wednesday makes every other Tuesday the longest day of the month for me. I am so excited to hammer out some bills and get the budget funded but I have to wait one more day. I hate the wait!

I've been pretty lazy with the budget for June. I did knock it out earlier in the month (like right after May's last check) but I am always tweaking it here and there and I really need to sit down and finalize it before the money gets here. It's been HOT here and tonight we're going to be at the Lehigh Valley IronPigs baseball game (FREE tickets...so it's not a budget buster...it's AAA baseball anyways) and it should be fun with the kids. We're going as guests in one of the boxes so we have food and drinks all paid for which is great.

I'm excited for tomorrow though. Payday!

One thing I love to do is play with the reports in Microsoft Money. I've been using it for years so I have every single solitary transaction downloaded right into Money so I can keep track of balances and spending and everything else. If you've read my most recent post in the debt tracker area you'd probably run from using Money! Well don't fear because it does have a use even for someone like me. There is a report called the Income and Spending report that will tell you by category every cent that you've made and spent from the dates that you decide. Well I decided this would be a great way to get a handle on how I got into this predicament of being (as of today) $95,714.92 in debt. Well here is the results of that report:

From 6/9/07 to 6/9/08:

Income: $263,049.02
That's every type of income (for us it would be salaries, bonuses, ebay income, rebates, etc.)

Expenses: $255963.03
Well...what the HECK did we spend Two hundred and fifty five thousand dollars on in one year? Oh it gets better!

There is what I like to call a top 3. Three expense categories which are all in the over $30,000 spent column. Yes that's over THIRTY THOUSAND spent column!

1) Taxes: $39,822.16
Obviously I can live with this one. Otherwise Uncle Sam probably wouldn't be too happy. Take that away from the above gross income and you have our net: $223,226.86. So where did it go?!!

2) Bank Charges: $36,994.30
You read that right. We sent almost $37,000 to the banks in interest charges, annual fees, monthly fees, etc. Are you kidding? Holy ouch Batman! When you've woken up from passing out you can continue...trust me I needed a few minutes after I first saw this number.

3) Vacation: $32,971.71
Now before you say that's insane no one would spend $33,000 on vacations...well go ahead and say it but it doesn't stop the bleeding. WOW. This includes Philadelphia to Seattle, Vancouver, Chicago a few times, St. John USVI, Phoenix and Hawaii. Yep we lived a little over the last twelve months...way, way, way, way, way beyond our means. It's crazy when it's a big number right in front of you.

***It drops considerably from here but I figured I would throw a couple more in here so you can get more of an idea where it's gone.

4) Home Improvement: $12,709.51
Well finally something we will actually see a return on. I mentioned the house which we bought for $400k in January of 2006 (brand new...we built it from the ground up.) We refi'd it in March of this year after it appraised at $470,000 to a 30 year fixed at 5.75 and included all our closing costs, insurance, etc (and had to pay off two ARM's..yeah...ouch) so we ended up having to borrow $405,000 to do that. The good news is the money above went to landscaping and some upgrades inside that we got our money back on and then some. It still hurts that we have such a large mortgage but at least this money didn't go to waste.)

5) Utilities: $9126.15
Electric, Propane gas (the highest), water/sewer, trash, cable, phone, etc. It equates to around $760/mo. I know it seems like a TON but it's really in the ballpark of what we budget for. Crazy isn't it.

OK so that's just the top 5! There are more...if I get some more time I might just post them. This is a wakeup call to anyone who doesn't budget. We did, then we didn't, now we are where we are. Yikes is about the only word I've got for you right now. !

Hi all! Ebay tracker is back up and running as so far I've made about $275 this month selling some used computer stuff and a couple of xbox 360 games I played out. Right now I have an old desktop PC listed so hopefully we can cash in there and up the tracker a bit more. There will be more to list as I have been getting into Ebay mode more and more lately. So the tracker goes:

June to date: $272.46

I don't have the YTD yet but I will have to total it up and see how we're doing. Good to be back!

OK well the debt reduction tracker balance is as high as ever but with a positive outlook I know we can knock this out as fast as possible. We're currently sitting on three credit cards and one mortgage so here is the beginning of the fight:

Debt tracker 06/09/08
Card 1: $44214.30 (8.99%)
Card 2: $30795.25 (9.99%)
Card 3: $20705.37 (11.24%)

That's it. Yeah I know that's a TON of cc debt but this is what we're facing. The minimum payment on card 1 is $700 and the minimums on cards 2 and 3 are usually 2 percent of the balance (after the finance charge hits...thanks AMEX.) We're doing everything we can to throw as much extra $ as possible at Card 3 so we can get it down that much faster and then we'll attack Card 2 and then finally Card 1. I don't expect to see another charge on these cards until the balances are zero other than finance charges so this should be the worst of it.

Payday is Wednesday and currently the only one of the above three with a payment due in June is Card 1 and I will be paying them the $700 that day. Thankfully all accounts are current (no late payments!)

We also have a single mortgage at $404174.16 at 5.875 but it will be awhile before we pay that thing off. House was appraised in March for $470,000.00 so we have some equity but we have a long ways to go. This is going to be a long haul!

Hi all,

Well after a year of being missing in action I've decided to come back and hopefully get ourselves in order. We definately are in pretty deep again and we're sick and tired of it so we've committed ourselves to be a cash only family until we are out of debt. Hopefully we can restart and recharge and get ourselves going in the right direction. I'm going to update our status as we go and hopefully we can stay committed and finish strong.

Glad to be back posting again. This time I hope to keep updates a lot more fresh. I'm excited to be back. Yay!

Well we refilled the $300 weekly cash budget yesterday and the wife went out and spent $200 on groceries (ouch!) so we're going to be hanging on to that last $100 for the rest of the week. We do plan on seeing a movie this weekend (Pirates!) with just the two of us and the kids will get their allowance so that should probably be it for the weekly spending. The weather is going to be iffy this weekend from what I hear so we'll be home hanging out for most of it. We're trying to get all of the flowers in before the rain so hopefully we'll have that done by tomorrow at the latest. We're really happy with the way the house is coming along!

Well we did some spending this weekend! We went out on Saturday and spent about $200 on flowers for the yard. We did get a lot of plantings and we have a few mulch beds to fill (we started yesterday and the wife's finishing up tonight). We also bought pizza for our kids and four of their friends ($35) so we've got about $65 left til Weds. That should be fine since we really don't have anything we need to spend money on.

Two days til weds and the $300 refill!

Just an FYI that yesterday was a no-spend day as we were busy! It rained pretty hard here for awhile and our landscapers came out and talked about some things we needed to have done (mulching, leveling, planting, etc.) and today they are at our house working! We are surprised at how fast they came out to start work (but we're really happy about it.) The estimate on the work we're having done is around $1100 for everything which seems to be in line with what we thought we were going to pay. My wife and I are also going to buy plants and flowers this weekend for the front and back yards and we have budgeted around $500 (we may need to buy some trees too...but we'll see how it goes). So if anything we have a big budget buster coming and I know it's going to go to the cards but we should be ok since it's 3 paycheck month I'm in a position to use that money to pay everything off right away (since we don't have to use the paycheck towards a mortgage payment).

We just came off prom as well and the total damage was around $800 for everything. We think we did ok since that number included a bbq party for her and 5 other couples and their parents at our house before they left (we did have to spend a bunch on food...ugh!) At least we have a lot of food left over and we are pretty sure we're not going to have to go to the grocery store this week.

So the expenses are coming fast and furious but hopefully we are well prepared to deal with them.

Again sorry for the 2 week intervals but it's been crazy the last few weeks at work. Well today is payday and we are getting the funds in order as we speak. I am still on the $300/wk cash budget and it has worked out really well for us as we've made a lot of progress.

05/16-05/23
Balance: $300

I have my first payment on the conso loan due 05/23 and it couldn't come at a better time for us since this is one of the two "3 paycheck" months we have in a year (we get paid every other week so May happens to be a 3 paycheck month!) I'm making sure to pay the "have to's" and then I'm going to attack the high rate balances and knock them down like I did with the debt tracker (which I will update when I get time!)

Hooray for payday and hooray for weekly cash budgets!

Sorry folks I was out of town for awhile on business and didn't get to post while I was gone. We'll get right back to it today when I can update the cash situation and where the numbers are at. We are still on the $300 weekly budget and doing well with it!

My daughter had a basketball tournament this weekend (AAU) and they did really well winning two of three games including a game where she scored 20 points (which is great for her!) She got scolded a bit about the game they lost because she was a little lazy on the court but she bounced back really strong to finish really well.

I had the HVAC people out today to raise our A/C unit outside (it was too low where it was installed and since we're on a hill the thing was sucking up all kinds of dirt and debris). They raised it for no charge and did the spring maintenance (we have a yearly maint contract with them that runs $100 for heating and air conditioning maintenance and inspections. It's due yearly in October.)

I just got my updated FICO scores as I finally got my one negative updated to show a zero balance and paid (I had been fighting them because I had paid it and they couldn't find any record of the payment. It was a Ford Motor Credit issue and they finally acknowledged it and updated it.) 749/705/709 are the current scores as of 4/27/07. I can't wait for Card 1 to update to zero (it still shows a $13k balance) and see how my scores do then!

We still haven't gotten the first payment date for the conso loan (which is only in my wife's name) but I believe June 1st will be the first due date. I'm planning for it now as payday is Wednesday.

Yippie!

***ETA: I just got a Score Watch update from Equifax noting my score going up to 709 from 696 so I updated it above. Yay!

Well we're doing really well and sitting at $253 in cash going into tonight. Tomorrow is budget refill day so tonight the wife is going grocery shopping and taking our daughter for a haircut. The good thing about the cut is usually she goes to the same stylist as my wife does and it runs us $100. She is going to her friend's mom's hair salon this time and my wife says it'll probably run about $30-40 which is a huge relief for $10 haircut dad!

This time I think we'll refill the dollars right to $300 but after a full run at the grocery store and the haircut we'll probably be pulling out a couple hundred. We'll see though!

I finally paid Card 1 off today! I made a $5891 payment on Card 1 so it is zeroed out. Card 10 also hit me with a post-payoff interest charge of $34 (which I promptly paid!) Here's what the matrix now looks like:

Card 2/$15153/$31000/12.24
Card 7/$5821/$11000/4.99*
Card 13/$4001/$4500/5.82*

*Balance Transfer rate (for life of bal)

We also have THREE loans to pay off so it's not like we're free and clear BUT we will be free and clear of all balances on credit cards once the above gets zeroed out.

We have outstanding $46k at 8.99, $79k at 9.5 and $314k at 6.75. The latter two will be refinanced in March of 2008. The plan once the above cards are extinguished will be to make the standard payment (I round up my mortgage payment every month and put the difference to additional principal) on the 6.75 and the 8.99 loans and to really throw extra dough at the 9.5 (until it's refi'd). We are expecting a $75k cash disbursement at the end of the year (probably end of fiscal 2007...so early 2008) and the hope is that we'll be able to throw that at the amount to be refi'd OR pay off the 8.99 loan and use the remainder to finish the basement (about 1400 sq ft). That's a long way down the road though!

That's the debt plate for now. I will be making another lump sum payment on Card 2 in the next couple of days. I still am figuring out what I'll have to throw at it (I don't have a cc payment due until May 12th so I should have a couple of paychecks to attack Card 2 in the next few weeks). It felt great to zero out Card 1 though...yippie!

Oh that was fun. Well the company did give us a check for $14,683.00 to pay taxes and we sure did pay! The feds got $5069 PLUS quarterly estimated for next year ($1812). Pennsylvania got $655 and quarterly estimtated for next year ($164). New Jersey got $164 and Delaware got $2 (I love you Delaware!) It leaves us with $6817 to pay down debt (yee haw!)

Card 1...it'll be nice knowing you! I don't have time right now to figure out exactly how we'll be attacking everything but I know Card 1's life on the matrix is coming to an end. Yay!

A few things to update. First off I updated my ING account info yesterday and have mailed a check for $1 (made out to myself) to establish a link between the new checking account and the ING savings accounts. When I do finally scratch out of the debt mess I will be filling this account up as part of the proactive money approach vs the current reactive money approach (paying off cc debt). Until I have an apr on a balance that is lower than the interest rate on the savings account I can't justify putting money in there. It would be nice to have an emergency fund but not at the cost of allowing the banks to earn more on my money than I can on theirs.

Now for debt tracker stuff. Today IS tax check day so I'm waiting to hear from the wife that we've gotten the money before I start blasting debt away. Card 2 must know I'm getting money as well since they hit me with a $153 finance charge (statement closed). The min payment on this one is $303 and it's due May 12th (I'll pay it this weekend). Here's the update to the debt tracker...for now:

Card 1/$5891/$20000/14.23
Card 2/$15153/$31000/12.24
Card 7/$5821/$11000/4.99*
Card 13/$4001/$4500/5.82*

*Balance Transfer rate (for life of bal)

I also had $188.65 in my Paypal account which I sent to the checking account today (takes 3-4 business days). I sold another item on Ebay for $39.99 so I wanted to add that to the total (I now currently have no items listed...and just about everything sold so it was a big success!)

$2438.55
+ $39.99
$2478.54

I'll update everything later today.

We're at $358 for the weekly budget since we had a no-spend day yesterday. The wife made a chicken caesar salad for dinner and everyone was shocked to see me engulf it. I'm a meat and potatoes guy but for some reason that salad was really good. I think my kids were going to pass out from shock!

We received a 90 dollar credit to our checking account because me the dopey guy transposed the two middle numbers on last week's atm deposit so they corrected it for us and the money showed up today. So now we have $223 in the account and I'm planning on waiting until Friday when the tax check gets deposited to make some debt tracker payments.

The wife may go grocery shopping tonight but we're not sure if she'll have time or not. If she does I'll update the budget.

I wanted to update where we were in the budget and another small ebay sale to add to the total. First we have $58 left of our $300 budget for this week and we also have next week's $300 in our pockets so we have to go 8 days on the $358.

Another ebay item sold bringing in $52.01 so I'll add that to the total. I only have one more item listed for sale right now but I hope to add more in the next few days (possibly this weekend as well).

$2386.54
+ $52.01
$2438.55

Oh and I almost forgot that another one of the cards from the matrix (Card 3) that was paid off had its statement close and they hit us with a $78 interest charge...which I promptly paid. We have $133 left in our checking account for now...in case any other interest charges want to rear their ugly heads!

Well since my last update we've sold a few more items for $206.44 so I can add that to the ebay money! Two items are left listed and one has three bids (currently at $27.01) so I know it'll sell. One other item has a couple of watchers but no bids but I'm not expecting much from it. I'm just glad to get rid of this stuff (and so is my wife!)

$2180.10
+$206.44
$2386.54

Well I had mentioned in the past about how we had some savings accounts scattered here and there with anywhere from $75 to $450 in them. I was able to close two over the weekend and both banks are mailing us checks for the balances which we will be putting into the checking account to pay off more debt. We ended up wiht an additional $250 from those two accounts and today we are going to a third bank that we have another savings account (with $450 in it) so we'll be able to use that to pay down more debt as well. It just doesn't make sense to me to carry balances on credit cards and give these lenders interest when we have the means and ability to continue to chop away at that debt.

We are waiting on Fedex to deliver some money for the company today and we should be seeing that tax return $ in the next day or two. $6820 will go a long way to paying down even more debt. The sooner the better!

Oh and another closed card decided to hit us with a final interest charge of $120 which I promptly paid. I will probably have one or two more of these before it's all said and done since we paid them off before the statements closed. Ah it's good to know those interest charges are history (especially on that card...one of the 18 percent cards).

FYI we did close the other savings and they gave us the cash at the bank ($420) and I gave the wife our $300 refill for this week and will be depositing the $120 into our checking account. This way she's got the cash to last until payday (9 days from today) and I can just use the tax money to attack more debt. That saves us a $300 withdrawal on Weds. Hopefully planning ahead works out!

Well after paying off a slew of cards with the conso loan I had a slight blowback from one card with a finance charge of $31 (the card is at zero balance). They also gave me a credit limit increase on that card from $3900 to $4800 (nice of them wasn't it?) I also made a $2800 payment on Card 1 (take that Card 1!) Here's the update:

Card 1/$5891/$20000/14.23
Card 2/$15000/$31000/12.24
Card 7/$5821/$11000/4.99*
Card 13/$4001/$4500/5.82*

*Balance Transfer rate (for life of bal)

OK well here is how we started spending that $4500 we deposited into our new joint checking account yesterday:

$700 for Mortgage (2nd mort payment)
$120 to Sewer (Utility)
$81 to Garbage (Utility)
$127 to County Theater (Donation)
$280 to weekly budget

All transactions have posted to the old checking account so I withdrew the last $20 from Wachovia and have closed the checking and savings accounts with them. I also spent part of the day updating as many online accounts as I could with the new checking info (as well as deleting the old info!) The $20 left goes with the $280 over to the wife for the weekly budget. She had $59 left (I thought she had $40...but it turns out she had more) so we get to go from today til next Weds with a $359 cash flow for the budget! She's going grocery shopping tonight (gulp!)

You can see I also made a donation to an old theater in our area that runs a lot of current and old movies (they are very small but they're fun). The donation got us 6 free movies for 2 people so we can make the most of it by going to that theater if there is a movie we like. It helps keep the theater going (since 1937) and they're probably the most friendly people that run that place so it's a treat to go down to the old theater to see a movie.

I also made a little dent in the matrix but I'll keep that in a different blog post.