Status update, mini-milestone, and coming to terms with the cost of hiking
No big topic to post about, but a lot of updates and musings to bring up. I’ve had some juicy overtime the last 2 paychecks, and one more to come. The last one I worked from 8:30 am to 10:45 at night!! My last 2 paychecks have been much larger than usual, which has allowed me to top up some of my savings, pay a bit towards the loan for my road bike, and pay a ton towards debt this month. I’ve gotten my SBA loan down to below $13,000, which is very satisfying! Having it be maxed out near $30,000, and not being able to touch it much, until all other debts were paid off, has made it seem a bit insurmountable. But since the interst is so darn low, it’s just sat there, untended…until now. Anyway lots of satisfaction in throwing all extra money towards diminishing it to zero is quite enjoyable.
I’m ok with having the zero interest loan for the road bike (for 6 months). While it is slowing down my debt payments, I was/am not willing to put off buying it for 1 1/2 – 2 years. The enjoyment I’ll get out of it is worth the delay in debt payment. However, my intention was to sell my old, unused road bike (that has the shifters on the frame not the handlebars and which I’m terrified to ride/use). I haven’t even done that yet. I have to clean it up a bit before photographing it and posting on craigslist, which is why I haven’t done it up ’til now.But now that I’m thinking about it, I will do that tomorrow or Monday.
I’m splurging a little this holiday weekend. I went out for sushi last night, which I had room for in the budget, and thoroughly enjoyed myself. I may also go for a movie later this weekend. Oh and of course my big drive/gas expenditure yesterday (see next paragraph for an explanation) – otherwise it will be a relatively normal weekend. Hanging out with friends and having a big meal and wine, but not too expensive in the grand scheme of things. Not quite sure if it’ll happen, but if there’s any money leftover at the end of the month, I am going to split it between debt and my emergency fund, which has been growing v-e-r-y slowly. I’d really like to get it up to $1,000 so I can leave it there untouched and unused. I realize that if I push to get it up to $1,000, then there’s a greater chance I’ll have to use it sooner than later, which sortof defeats the purpose of having it. So I’m doing it slowly, balancing between my normal spending, and other savings goals (like my upcoming $1,000 car maintenance/timing belt change in the next 2 months).
I took Friday off before the 3-day to have a more mini-4-day-vacation, since I never take time off. I drove up into the mountains and went for a hike. I realize that while I enjoy hiking, and have done it exensively in the last 2 years, I think I enjoy spending time with my girlfriend/hiking partner just as much as being there. You can cover a lot of ground on a 4-hour round trip drive and 4-6 hour hike! She can’t really hike this year, since she’s recovering from really bad planter fasciitis, so I either have to go solo, or don’t go. Well, this makes my 3rd hike so far this year, which is pretty pathetic compared to my previous 2 years. I’ve been doing it more for fitness reasons than a desperate urge to get out of town and into the green forests. Yesterday I realized that maybe I don’t have to do hiking as much as I used to. It’s ok, I can do other things, like concentrate on going for bike rides in and around Seattle! Especially when I look at my gas spending, which is significant, to get to the hiking destinations – I drove 260 miles yesterday. For a single day of activity. It was great when it was 2 people alternating driving and paying for gas. Now it’s just me. So I think I may hold off on going hiking as much as I feel I ought to, and in turn reduce my gas spending and stay in town, and overall be a little happier, or at least not beat myself up when I don’t get out.
Gas prices – 1
debtmaven – 0
That’s all I have to report.
debtmaven out
The great internal debate (on food spending)
My food spending is out of control. I don’t know quite why. It could be that now I drive by my favorite, yet the most expensive/upscale market just before I get home, so I tend to stop there more frequently. It could be that I’m single and responsible for all of my food purchases and solely responsible for any food that is uneaten and wasted. Could be I have expensive tastes! I thought that buying more often and in smaller quantities would prevent food waste and help me stay within budget (see my recent post on food frugality). Well, I’m happy to report that there’s much less food wasted, but my budget is even more out of control now than usual. I think I’m going to blame the high-end prices and my impulses of being hungry and wanting a certain food item right as I’m nearing home and driving by.
I spent over $550 on groceries in April, and I’m a single person, no family, no kids, no partner. And about $150 in eating out (lunches, things grabbed on the go, etc). Egads, over $700/month for food! I’m still trying to figure this out. When I was with mr. maven I was able to keep my spending to $300-$400/month. I have to get back on track. I refuse to let food defeat me and my budget.
Ok, enough with the recriminations. What am I going to do about it? I’m trying to keep a really clear understanding of my spending on a daily basis. I’ve raised my budget to be $400/month for food spending (not including restaurant spending). Good quality produce and meats cost a lot. I don’t do packaged foods and coupons are useless – they don’t apply to uncooked raw materials. Safeway is one of the lower budget supermarkets I can also shop at, but I find their quality horrid and refuse to shop there. Anyway, back to it. If I break out that $40 into a daily limit, it comes out to about $13/day.
I do my budget in an Excel spreadsheet. I love it – it lets me have a bit of flexibility to add features and change things easily. I have found the online budgets really constricting and without the control I crave. A perfect example – I’ve added a little extra part to my monthly budget this past week. When I go in and enter my spending every few days, I update my little food spending chart. I look at the total I’ve spent on groceries, and I enter how many days are into the month so far. I then can easily figure out that so far this month, I’ve spent $91 in the past 7 days. That comes out to be $13/day – I’m exactly on target to maintain my budget. I also have an extrapolation portion – it takes that daily amount (to date) and figures out how much I’m going to be over (or under) budget if I continue to spend that way for the rest of the month. It’s a little exercise in keeping tabs on how I’m doing, rather than freaking out over how many times I’ve spent money on groceries (as I said, I’m going almost every day). It can be hard to see a gazillion entries in the food category and not be able to easily see if I’m on track or over budget.
This system is already helping. I had a taste for a steak salad last night (my latest favorite is grapefruit/goat cheese/steak slices on salad with freshly roasted beets). Steak and grapefruit is an amazing combination, and the juice leftover from cutting up the grapefruit is great in vinaigrette! It was a monumental mental struggle on my way home yesterday. Do I stop and get a steak? It would be a better deal and more options if I stop at Costco and get a 3-pack for $24 and freeze what I don’t use for later? What decided me was my daily budget. If I stopped and bought a steak I’d be in a serious deficit already, 1 week into my budget. If I didn’t stop I could have gyoza dumplings on my roasted beat goat cheese salad (I have a few bags from the asian market in my freezer – $3.99 for 30, enough for 3 meals in a bag). Well, the internal budget discussion won over my impulse buying behavior. I did not stop at any store. I went home and roasted beats, cleaned my kitchen, and made a gyoza dumpling salad. Yum. Yeah for my daily food chart. It’s the little things that are keeping me focused. I’ll report how I do by the end of the month, promise.
Budget – 1
Steak – 0
debtmaven out.
DebtMaven 