Hump Day Brain Dump

I don't really want to write a "real" post today, because I'm still in a rather foul mood. So here's bits and pieces of everything, also known around the blogosphere as a "brain dump":

-I have not finished reading the first book, and we're 2 months down into the year. I'm not sure why, but after all this time, I just CANT seem to sit down and just read. I've been forced (sometimes voluntarily) to multitask. I can't multitask while reading and it drives me nuts.
-I have paid over $1,300 to my parents' household since January. UNSCHEDULED payments. Add the scheduled payments and the number goes up by another $1,100. I'm working on getting the unscheduled portion back (and already have gotten $550 back as of a few min ago).
-I don't want to look at what actually happened with the above statement, in terms of my Feb budget. I think it will make me sick, and I'm already feeling sick as is.

-I FINALLY reached the 25k points on my credit card. I'll be cashing in on that ($250 credit!) and cutting the card into tiny little pieces. I'll make confetti out of the card.

-I applied for a new credit card. I did so because I've been wanting a good card with decent rewards for when I dump my CC1, and this one had a $300 sign up bonus. I'll be using it same-as-cash (using it, then paying it off 2 days later with money already budgetted), but I'll be getting the rewards/points. I will be making that card work for me instead of me working for it.
-I found out my credit score is about 709 (out of 990 or something) according to the application from the credit card company, which did not qualify me for 'premium' rates. Which sucks. But it's better than I expected.

-I am still blissfully ignorant about credit scores and all that, but I hope the slight increase in available credit compared to what I owe will do me some good. 

Take a breather.

-I opened an ING checking account for easier access to my ING savings account. And there's a $50 credit.

-Total credits I can expect within the next 60 days totals $600 ($250 from CC1's 25k points, CC3's $300 sign up bonus and ING's $50 bonus). ALL of it will go into a lump payment to my CC1.

-I'm ticked off beyond belief at my parents.

-I haven't planned anything for either of my trips and I really have to. Especially the NY one.

-I'm getting knots on my stomach about my trip to Chicago. You know, those knots that go "what the $!#%^ were you thinking?"

-I gained 2 pounds. So my challenge update is rather sucky, at 3lbs lost. Stress did this!

-I have slept a total of 10~12 hours since Saturday.

-I need a haircut. I am getting a haircut. I don't want to get a haircut. I definitely don't want to pay for a haircut. But I need it and will be talking to a stylist today. Sigh.

-I am slowly catching back to all the blogs and trying to make a worthwhile post (unlike this one).

-I have the opportunity to get my own cellphone line. I'm looking into that.

-If I go for a separate phone plan, even if it will be more expensive than being in a family plan, I'll look into getting my own car insurance as well. That'd mean I'll fully be disconnected from sharing ANY bills with my parents/family.

And that's that. I'll be doing a review of February tonight or tomorrow. It is looking a really whole lot like a horror story, to be honest. Am I the only one that can't believe February is already gone? I hope not. I am also VERY glad it is gone.

Hello, you pretty thing!

Completely unrelated and random, but I’ve been seeing this good looking piece of equipment around town…

I have never been one to be picky about cars. All that I've asked is that they go from point A to point B without coughing up their mechanical lungs or screeching loud enough you can hear them miles away.
I know I should never judge a book by its cover, a person by their clothes, or a car by the color of their paint, but that light blue really made me turn my head. Several times.

Since my last car died last October, I have started trying to develop a preference. It is a goal of mine to buy a car at some point during 2014. So far, my effort to develop a preference has been more about what I don’t like. I don’t like cars that look too long because of a 9th passenger row. I'm a bit partial to hatchback cars, leaning on the "no" side. I don’t like SUVs. Or trucks. I don’t like 2door cars. I don’t like them sitting so high up the ground that you need a step ladder to get in. I don’t like the change stick behind the steering wheel.

But that blue, oh yeah. I like that blue. It's a Hyundai Accent. I've always liked Hyundai cars. I think I am snapping a photo of that car next time I see it and putting it up my inspiration corner.

Have you found something that inspires you recently, and added that to your inspiration board?

Let's talk vacations!

I swear to you, the first stretch of the year is the hardest and longest. If you’re like me and you’re not blessed with flexible time off or multiple Federal holidays, this first stretch can be anywhere from 14-22 weeks without a break! Here’s what will be going on with me. And yeah, I can post about it because I don’t have a house or apartment or anything like that for people to go and steal my stuff while I'm away. Ha-ha!

1. Sometime in the third weekend of March, I will be going to NY. I’m still trying to work with the hotel and see what dates are best (and offer a reasonable discount). This coincides with my DC friend’s spring break.
2. March 30 to Apr 6 I will be in Chicago! I love this place. It’s my dream to move there, in a short 3 years… this coincides with my best friends’ spring break from school, and I can stay at his place, so no hotel cost and minimal food costs.
3. This one is tentative, but a friend of mine from Florida who now lives in China with his wife may be coming over on or around the end of July. I would love to spend time with them, so I may join them at a convention.

Yeah, I do plan my vacations around other peoples’ schedules. But that’s a-OK with me for the time being, since all I really want to do is have fun with them.

Now, let’s talk about budgets. Woo-hoo!
-Vacation #1: This one is hard to estimate at the present time. We may stay in NY 1 or 2 days. We may stay at a nearby hotel or a farther hotel than our destination. So depending on those aspects, my costs are capped at $400 including food, hotel and transportation (5hr drive each way).
-Vacation #2: Airfare was $300 (rounded), so I will throw in another $150 for food and what not. Not that they will let me pay for anything, but still, if I can contribute to anything, I’ll try. I know it’s not easy to entertain for a week!
-Vacation #3: This is another toughie. Depending on what I can work as far as hotels, I may get away with $100 for the rooms, plus any food expenses, so I am capping this one at $250.

Total maximum is $1100 for 3 vacations. I know it sounds like a lot.
I am very proud that I have $1000 in my EF. I have $1025 in my vacation fund (including the $300 already paid for airfare). With the additional March paycheck, I would have about $1500 saved up altogether! I’m in no way spending it all or more than what I have budgeted, but I like the look of that cushion. An EF is truly peace of mind.

How do you go about planning for your vacation(s)? Do you space them out through the year? Do you prefer 1 big vacation or multiple smaller ones?

And now for some commercial messages... (aka, another rant about my parents)

I’ll be honest here. I have had a couple of bad weeks since my parents left and this has been preventing me from posting about, well, anything but things I had prearranged. I am really troubled. And I’ll just put it all out here just so I can move on with my life.

As I had mentioned before, my parents left on their vacation for 15 days and are scheduled to return today or tomorrow. I honestly don’t know. They took their shiny new iPad with them. They left no bills paid. Left no food in the fridge. They didn’t even pay me back for the car insurance portion. I am starting to honestly consider the possibility they will not pay for the car insurance this time around either and I will get tackled with the costs. I feel sick just thinking about this.

I think they probably played me again. I don’t know why in heaven’s name I care about how they do. In these past 2 weeks, I’ve been going back and forth between where I currently live to my parents’ house to cook and clean and do laundry. I’m a guilty-as-charged enabler, and this really bites. I am still helping them out of my own time and pockets without any appreciation. They won’t even acknowledge my efforts.

My parents have really broken my heart and part of my spirit big time. AGAIN. I wish I could say it’s for the last time, but it won’t be. So that is where my desire to write posts has gone. I’ve done and deleted many drafts but they all sounded rather whiny. My parents honestly do not care and I shouldn’t care either. But I DO. I care they’re leaving my younger siblings without food in the house, without instructions of how to take care of the house/bills, how to contact my parents, anything. They just leave. Mother, dad: you fail.

I discovered two things:

1. They have discouraged me from ever becoming part of a family again. I never had intentions of marrying to begin with, but now I know for certain I won’t. I just don’t want to risk having in this sort of situation ever again.

2. I realized I am no better than an addict. At the bottom of these issues, I am still doing something that I know is bad for me, probably bad for them, it is costly, dangerous, toxic, and I cannot stop doing it. 

Both of those things have been beating down on me.

So there! That’s all said. Now I can carry on.  Phew.

Monday/Thursday Budget Recap 2/16/12 (Belated)

Here's my budget covering days from 2/3/12 to 2/16/12.

(7 of 14 days were no-spend days.)

Category: Spent / Scheduled
Groceries: $27.19 / $60
Personal: $84.09 / $40
Gasoline: $43.05 /$50

Grand total: $156.33 / $150.00. Yup, slightly overbudget, but that's alright. Clothes are heck expensive! Could've been a lot worse, considering I am now spending more money going back and forth to my parents' house to cook and clean and do all of that fun stuff. At least I am not getting involved with their bills. Yet. I can assure you I will have to pay for more stuff than I want to, once they return...

But on the bright side, did I mention that March is a THREE paycheck month? Since I'm paid biweekly, I'll receive a paycheck on 3/2, 3/16 and 3/30. I am so very excited about this. In theory, that extra paycheck could pay for the full vacation budget!

Purchasing airfare has always made me nervous. Cancellation sometimes costs more than half the actual airfare. It’s kind of a take it or leave it, and you can lose a lot by booking at the wrong times. I had budgeted $350 for airfare for my vacation, since this is the low-average for the particular trip. I got REALLY lucky and was able to book it for $300. The price was only up for like 2 hours on Friday, and I managed to catch it. Needless to say, I’m proud of myself. Only $50 down, but that’s $50 back in my pockets.

Are you the type of person that would wait and risk having a better/worse deal or someone that'd just take it at a value that you're comfortable with?

These images make me happy. For anyone looking for airfare, Yapta is a great tracker, and Bing.com/travel is a decent predictor. Good tools when combined.

Uff, I was it! I didn't forget!

After being tagged by Little Lamb and Jane (I feel like cattle now!), here are their questions. Sorry it took me a while to get to this.

But as with lots of things, first comes some rules!
1 - Post these rules. (Done!)
2 - Answer the 11 questions from the person who tagged you. (In process)
3 - Create 11 new questions for the people you tag. (Skipping. I suck, I know.)
4 - Tag 11 people and link them to your post. (Most of the people I know of have been tagged, so perhaps we can call this a skip?)
5 - Let them know that you tagged them. (Stalking? My favorite sport!)

The questions Little Lamb asked:
1) What do you think is the biggest financial challenge you currently face?
My parents. And how to stop being an enabler to them. It really uses too much of my funding and messes up my planning.
2) What is the best money saving tip you can share?
With savings: out of sight, out of mind. I love having something in a savings account I can look at every day... but I also like to have something that's a bit farther away from my immediate sight (like an ING account or tucking away $20 into a forgotten pocket).
3) What is the biggest challenge you have faced in your life and how did you overcome it?
Biggest challenge was to remove myself from my family. Being one of two main supporters, and having my money be thrown into a black hole with no control or say, as well as still being financially in a path of doom, living paycheck to paycheck.
4) What is your proudest accomplishment?
I'm starting to sound obsessive, but moving out was the proudest accomplishment. Took me over 7 months to gather the guts and about 2 months after deciding to do it before I actually did it.
5) What is the best piece of advise you have been given during your life?
You have to look out for #1 (aka, yourself). It may sound mean at times, but in the long run, it makes sense. It doesn't mean you have to disregard everyone else, but you do have to take care of yourself because nobody has more interest in you doing better than you.
6) What is the best cleaning tip you can share?
Start with the biggest chore first. Think of it was a car while you run chores. Go to the store/chore that is the farthest, that way your car will be warmed up and do better during the whole trip, vs going to the closest store first, which means your car will not heat up properly and be less efficient.
7) Do you clean a little each day or save it all for a specific time?
All at once for me. My attention span is short as is, I couldn't manage to clean a little here and there.
8) What chore is your least favourite and how do you make it more pleasant?
Vacuuming. I put good music and my headphones on and I'm good to go! Same goes for cutting grass. I guess I don't like pushing things around, do I?
9) What do you wish you did more often?
Take photos of myself and places and events. With such a feeble memory, photos are a big deal.
10) What is one important thing about you that you would like to share?
A positive attitude and being kind do pay up. You may not always see it, but it does. I'm a closet-compassionate person. I keep it under wraps because seems some of my friends think it's just weird to offer an umbrella to an older person, or to give your $ off coupons to the person behind you at the store. It's always too little to be helpful or too much as if showing off, for some people.
11) What did your mother (or other loved adult) used to do that you always said you would never do yet somehow you do it too?!
Hmm... talk on the phone while driving. It's a danger. I normally throw my stuff in the back of the car so I don't get tempted to do this.

Then Jane asked:
1. Describe yourself in seven words.
Loyal 20-something looking to move
2. Why did you decide to start a blog?
Accountability, really. Also, it allows me to better interact with other like-minded people.
3. What is your favorite kind of cheese?
Colby Jack.
4. What keeps you awake at night?
Knowing I have a hearing coming up at work, or wondering how to budget for a mini catastrophe. Or wondering what the heck my parents are doing that they can't get things under reasonable control!
5. If you could change one thing about yourself what would it be?
Not develop the uncanny ability to forget. I have forgotten so much of my younger life, voluntarily, that it became an automatic self-defense mechanism. Now my memory is just sucky.
6. Here's a question from Michael that he likes to ask me on the phone: "What are you wearing right now?"
Clothes. It's Valentine's day, so assume it's something red!
7. Tell us something about the person who tagged you!
She's awesome, can cook, and now she has a clean fridge! Very active, and definitely a role model. Right perspective on the whole retirement thing. Too many people wait too late to enjoy their lives. I never really liked the work-to-retire idea. I'll work to enjoy and retire when work stops being an option.
8. Stretch out your arm and tell us what is the closest thing to you right now?
My laptop bag.
9. What's your favorite flavour of icecream? Do you lick your icecream or bite right into it?
Pistachio. I lick it, because my older brother has always had sensitive teeth, and I copied his behavior and never really bit into my ice cream because he never did. I'm such a follower.
10. Do you prefer the truth or a white lie that doesn't hurt your feelings?
Truth. I can't improve on lies.
11. Do you like your life right now? Why or why not?
I like the challenges, even if it makes me sad to deal with them. But I am able to travel and meet people that I would've otherwise not really cared to go meet because of the distance, so it works for me. I'm quite content, I'd say!

Thanks for the tags, ladies!

Happy Valentine's Day + Stats

Happy Valentine's Day! 

Quick update on my stats:
Budget for February:
Bi-weekly budget: $111.28 / $100
(Broken into $84.09 misc and $27.19 groceries.)
Gas budget: $45.00 / $50

Overall Feb budget: $156.28 / $300

Slightly over, but I am rather happy. Clothes just aren't cheap, and I did build my budget knowing that I would rarely be spending a lot in misc items, specifically on clothes. I shouldn't have to touch the next $40 of misc. money on this second half, so it should even out. However, most of my savings may go to gas for my car since I'll be traveling a lot more...

Declutter:

                   

Plus I ended getting rid of the third box. Seems it was just full of random junk I got rid of. I didn't count the items since they're so small, but that + clothes = <40 items!

Extra challenge:
I went ahead and used some of the Christmas stamps (just the red ones) and sent out 5 Happy Friendship Day/Valentine's Day cards to some of my younger friends yesterday. They were simple and written on sheets of paper, so they didn't cost me a thing. I borrowed some envelopes from some leftover Christmas bulk cards. And I had to use those stamps anyway. So bonus challenge, done! Yeah, they may get them a bit late, but better later than never.

Hope everyone has a wonderful day today with their loved ones!

Challenge updates and parents' absence

With my parents gone, nothing gets done at their house. That includes groceries, cooking, cleaning, laundry, feeding the dog, etc. Sadly, I am the type that will get them done for them, so I was traveling back and forth mid last week to go to my parents' house and clean and cook and play Cinderella man. I've also been rather upset at how things are going down on that home-front and my parents in general, but I won't bore you with that.

This weekend I had to work on Friday on my part time job (left right after my full time job), then crashed at my parents' house and did more cleaning and cooking in the morning, then went shopping. For myself. Yay! I have a new pair of jeans. I was proud of myself. I was looking for a very specific jacket which one of my younger brothers had 'borrowed' from me yet never returned, and I also found that after only 2.5 hours of searching. I don't get why/how people can like shopping. It was driving me nuts!

I don't have the exact numbers right now, but this weekend was expensive, while still within budget. I did buy food (twice) for my parents' house, but I am taking that out of the money I was supposed to pay to them anyway (I pay an additional $100/mo to help with the phone bills or whatever else needs to be paid). So it won't throw my February budget out of balance.

I had a chance to weigh myself, and for the Erika's 10lb challenge, I've lost 3~4lbs, and we're halfway through the challenge! It's ok, I always start slow. Like, very very slow. But I must kick it into high gear if I want to still be part of the -10lb club. I will be doing a bit more walking, which I did some last week, but not enough because I was mostly traveling or doing chores. I do feel clothes fitting a lot nicely, so that's always a plus.

Last, for Carla's low-spend February, I'm still right on track and need to get my numbers together tonight. For the de-cluttering challenge, I did clean on Thursday if I remember correctly, but I didn't take any photos. Have to do that tonight. I actually know where my things are again! Hurray!

I'll be catching up to everyone's posts soon. Hope everyone had a great weekend!

PS: And to the few of you that have today off or next Monday or both, I'm jealous! I want a Monday off!
PPS: And to those of us that get paid on a bi-weekly basis, if you get paid this week, then March is a 3-paycheck month. Hurray!

Rollercoaster weekend

I got little sleep after work on Saturday, and woke up very early on Sunday. My brother and wifey came by. We chatted a bit. While talking about them and their family, out of the blue, I realized something...

My parents are traveling back to our home country for 15 days starting today for some reason I'm not afforded to know. While they're out, they wanted me to pay for some things. Which I agreed to as long as they deposited the money first. Then they didn't have the money to buy their tickets ($560) until Friday, so I offered to pay the tickets and get refunded on Fri plus any extra bills they wanted paid. Friday came and went, I asked for the payments and they finally made it the following Tuesday. But I only got $600. In between all that happening, I already had to pay for the car insurance which they refund me for as agreed. I pay for the car insurance from my bank account because we needed to set billpay for a discount, and we linked it to mine since we couldn't link it to theirs.

After paying the $40, I told them all that was still missing, including the car insurance. About $700 worth of bills. I know it wasn't happening. So I just left it to them pay for the stuff themselves and stopped following up. Except for the car insurance I did pay. I forgot all about it until Sunday morning. I went back and read my notes and saw the cash movement. Yup. I had let that one slip. I asked my dad if they were planning to pay the rest of the stuff. I asked 7 times. He doesn't know. They will. They'll try. No conclusive answer. So now I know for sure I won't get that. I will consider it their gift for going home. Hopefully they have some fun. But I'm pretty ticked off at myself for not catching that.

I’m $280 behind because of this little mishap. I’ll count this separately from my budget, as this was a limitation I had mentioned for the challenge.

Now, here’s a healthy dosage of good things:
-I bought a shirt for $6.36. It’s nice, plain and boring. But it’s long sleeved and good for layering. I also tried some other clothes, but none of them fit me right. At least I tried.
-I also bought a wireless computer mouse. I’ve wanted one for the past 3-4 months, and finally found a good one for $7.49 on reduced sale.
-I cleaned the closet, thanks to Carla, and got rid of some clothes.
-I haven’t really spent anything in groceries. I might not have to either until this weekend. Success!
-I’m working Friday at my other job at their request, even though I was originally off. I could use the extra money to offset those $280.
-Thanks to my driving habits (ha…, no honestly. I was the only one that qualified for a discount) we qualified for lower insurance premiums. The rate is not finalized or anything yet, but it is scheduled to go down to $222/mo instead of $280/mo.

I am fighting a bit of an internal battle about what to do about the rate change. I could tell my dad the price remained at $280 and just pocket the ~$60 overage. Not for me of course… for their secret EF fund. Their secret EF fund is locked in at $250 (which was what my portion when we sold my car for pieces when it died). I keep forgetting that money exists. OR I could just tell them the rates went down and have them pay $222. What should I do?

There is no way in this side of heaven that they would manage the extra money. As in, they wouldn’t consider it as someone who’s conscious about their money would. They don’t know how the money moves in that house as is, so this ‘extra’ money would just get sucked into the black hole.

De-clutter February Challenge 2: Start

We're into week 2 for De-cluttering February.

Since I don't have a "Family space/room" to clean, I'll be dealing with the odds and ends of my personal space. Here's what I will be dealing with...

Exhibit 1: Bottom drawer. This holds a few food containers, my contact lenses boxes and every important paper I should be keeping, split with that blue bag next to it. That's about a year worth of paystubs and tax forms. Exhibit 2 are the 3 drawers of a mini organizing tower. Lots of broken earphones, craft items, pens, and smaller electronics. Can't get more random than its contents. Exhibit 3: Disregard that thing about Ex. 2 not getting any more random. Ex. 3 is where it's at. It has a lot of sample products and things I haven't used (soaps, shampoos, lotions, makeup), as well as medicine from the one time I got sick in the past 3 years. I hate to waste medicine, but I just am not sick that often, thankfully. I'm sure it's expired by now anyway.

The only legitimate way I can see of tackling this one is to actually get rid of a lot of the stuff. Since I'm working on Friday (at both works, yay extra income) I will have to get this complete this before then.

So there you have it!

De-clutter February Challenge 1: DONE!

So, I actually finished cleaning at the 11th hour yesterday. But I was so tired and went to sleep, and I seriously haven't had much of a break until now. So here's some After photos!

While trying to figure out what to do with the sewing machine, I discovered I have a LOT more fabrics than I thought I did. I must get rid of it... by making some things. We shall see.

I got rid of some clothes. So now I have less of them! Yay. Wait, wasnt I trying to grow my wardrobe? 

I wish I could say this was a happy ending, but... we had leftovers. And not of the edible kind.

So the box of summer/warm weather clothes is going under the bed to join another box. The bag is full of clothes that will get donated or tossed. So are those two coats on top of the box. The black suitcase like thing is my younger brother's Playstation, and will be going back to him this weekend. Same thing with the keyboard. I will sort the clothes during this second week, when I tackle the second portion of my personal space.

As for the Low-Spend February, I've only spent about $13.75 which I'll talk about later. A shirt and a mouse for my computer. The mouse is for the computer, not the shirt. I'm not THAT weird. Yet.

De-clutter February update #1

And here's my first update for Decluttering February.

Clara said that the proof was in the pudding…

It wasn’t. I know because I finished the whole cup of chocolate pudding looking for it. Just for research purposes, I assure you. There was no proof. I was crushed. So instead, I had to do this the hard way.

Subject of declutter week 1:

My closet. As I had mentioned, I live pretty much out of that single room. So everything I ‘own’ has to go in there. I don’t keep anything of mine at my parents’ anymore. Not that I had that much to begin with, but yeah. It doesn’t look that bad because I’ll admit, I purged a bit in December getting ready for the New Year. But like any bad/lazy solution, this didn’t last very long.

The top racks are a mess. Also, I can’t take photos. So please deal with me. On the left side we have some clothes I use for going out. And some sleeping clothes I didn’t even know I had. And my work out outfit. And some books. And a pair of Christmas penguins I was given to decorate the room with. Last (not visible but in that vicinity), a gray trash bag full of bills from my parents’ house I took to declutter from them. Never got rid of them because of the sensitive info. How do you guys get rid of a lot of papers that contain sensible information?

Then a lot of misc. mess.

Bag of clothes I need to sort through. I actually put the sewing machine in the box this past December. I think I’ll have to take it out again.

Carry-on bag I use when I travel and my old keyboard. The box the carry-on sits on is a case of paper box full of my warm-weather clothes. There’s another such box under the bed, and one under the sewing machine that contains a lot of random items and stuff like soaps and more books.

My clothes. They suck, I know. But they keep me warm and dressed. These are the winter ones, and they’ll trade places and go into the boxes once the warm weather arrives. (Yes, I am a girl. I just write as a boy because I’m odd like that.)

I started to clean this, but I had to work today, so I left it halfway. I hope to get home early tomorrow and post some after-clean up photos.

A new goal appears!

Good thing I left some space in my goals for the year. Because I think I've started a new one.

I am so up for Carla's first bonus challenge of donating something to the food bank. I decided to buy some pantry items to give out. The cereal was on sale, and plus coupons, it came out to be pretty cheap. That, and some FiberOne energy bars. Yes, I know. Not the healthiest selection, but heck, we don't buy ALL healthy stuff for us. I know I'd appreciate these choices, knowing my sweet tooth.

All this has gone to the local food pantry with the church. Best of all? It only cost me $3.54 for all of this. I made two mistakes on these purchases, otherwise, it would've been about $1 lower. I originally had 10 items, but only 8 items got donated, since I gave my partner at work two assorted FiberOne energy bar boxes ($0.76 not accounted for above, since it wasn't really charity). My partner at work is always giving me candy... and Lifesavers (no, it's NOT a hint!). I made sure it wasn't. She just buys them in bulk and hands them out. Anyway. Not a hint.

Moving on... I want to make it a goal to donate an approximate of $100 worth of stuff. Or 100 items, whichever comes first. I will be using their on-sale, before coupons price, and per unit count. There will be times I find REALLY good deals. I want to go at them and donate the overage to the local food pantry. This donation gets me started with 8 items and $15.04 worth of goods.

As for the Low-Spend February, this was my first expense! Totaling $10.12, I used a total of $17.50 in coupons. The other things I bought was some meatballs (marked down), grapefruit juice and soy sauce. Not sure if I need to go grocery shopping this week, but since it's my chance to a larger store selection, I just might!

I will be working tonight on my closet, so stay tunned.

Thursday Budget Recap 2/2/12 & Most/Least of purchases

Time to make this roundup again. So here's what happened for the days from 1/20/12 to 2/2/12. Extremely boring and uneventful. But lots of savings!

(11 of 14 days were no-spend days.)

Category: Spent / Scheduled
Groceries: $54.52 / $60
Personal: $0 / $40
Gasoline: $43.05 /$50

Grand total: $97.57 / $150.00. So, woo hoo! The remaining went into a snowball to my credit card. Here's for a just-as-successful February!

Also, TeacHer Finance has a really cool way to classify your purchases, called Most and Least. Purchases get categorized into Most/Least expensive, exciting and/or fun. Sadly, my budget was all groceries. And gas. Nothing exciting, fun or expensive outside the norm. So there's that! Make sure to give her a shout. I hope my purchases get a bit more fun so I can participate!

Is it really February? Thinking of Vacations

Yup, I am sure you have heard that line about a dozen times by now. So let me make it 13! I like prime numbers.

I have, hidden in the dephts of a tab in my iGoogle homepage, two counters. One counts down to the next day off from work (yes, they're that few and far between!) and the other counts for vacations. December was truly an odd month for me, and so was January. Extremely busy and full of unusual tasks. Both months are done and gone, so I can resume to my normal tasks. I glanced over my vacation counter and I see a 68. 68 days before my next already-planned vacation. Last time I saw it, it was on 112. I am panicked a bit. Very little is planned for this vacation. To make matters worse, there is even less planned for a spur-of-the-moment vacation that will take place two weeks prior. I can tell you about vacation #1 (unplanned), and save #2 for later.

Vacation #1 is scheduled to be at some point during the 4th or 5th week of March. That's when my half brother goes on spring break from school, and I want to take him to NY. Since he's never been there and he’s about 2,820mi from home. I'll book us a room in NY or close to it and we will wander for the weekend. Trying to keep this as affordable as possible, so we'll mostly be doing sight seeing and lots of walking.

Me and my half brother have known each other for 9 long years as of 2/1/12. I spammed his phone to remind him that (yeah, he pretty much put up that face of 'what the heck? Who remembers stuff like that?'). Then told me to leave him alone because he has exams tomorrow. Can't blame him, as he's been sick for the past 2 weeks. California people seem rather susceptible to East Coast weather. Another bad thing about him is that he is completely hands off. I have to plan this whole thing by myself, and I am not even the one sightseeing as much.

But that’s what’s going on around my end. I’ll roll out another post about vacation #1 and hopefully indulge myself in sharing info about vacation #2!