Net Worth: July 2014
July 15, 2014
Change from June: 35% 125% increase
Change from January: 118% 262% increase
On Money
I’m still focused on Swagbucks to earn Amazon money for household things we need. Feel free to join using my referral link if you like!
How is our total net worth increasing when I know we just paid big bucks out this month to the tune of $5000+? I don’t think “gift horses” apply here. I’m half convinced there’s something wrong with my math, but I haven’t found the error yet so we’re going with it. I found the error. And good gravy it’s in our favor again. It’s amazing how just being one cell off in these spreadsheets can make the numbers wonky so I’m both grateful that I’ve caught it and that it went up, not down.
We’re looking at a heck of a lot of expenses coming up too, short term and long term, so I’m doing my best to ensure we maintain growth as long as possible before our finances start taking body blows.
In the meantime, I have our 2013 taxes to face down, 2014 taxes to plan for, and it’s well past time PiC and I got our act together on estate planning. I’m locating a good CPA to help with the taxes because I don’t have the time/energy to devote to winkling out every last detail anymore and an estate planning lawyer to start getting our estate plan in place. It could be done online, sure, but I’ve seen some reports where paperwork done improperly through the online forms didn’t hold up and left the estate in disarray. I’m not comfortable enough to go on my own research and homegrown expertise on this.
On Life
We’re in the middle of needing a lot of things: furniture, rugs to replace the thrashed rugs that mainly serve Doggle’s needs, an entire set of second-dog things, and it’s got me beating the bushes for ways to clear out space (donate, donate, sell on Craigslist, donate, trash) and earn some more cash to pay for these things.
PiC’s in charge of the Craigslisting while I’m in charge of the donations. I’ve found a homeless shelter that will take the household things that aren’t really Goodwill material but are in good shape for use: utensils, toys for kids, etc. Then again, he’s also in charge of buying from Craigslist by common consent, he loves searching CL and has this whole system going, while I’m much better at other kinds of bargain shopping. So that’s keeping us busy.
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No sooner do I make the travel arrangements for one trip, another one creeps up demanding my attention. We have some major travel (in terms of time and money) coming up and it’s got me wishing to take Doggle and absconding to a hotel for the weekend where I don’t do any work, thinking or anything other than eating, walking and sleeping. Now *that’s* a vacation! (inspired by Lauren’s weekending, actually.)
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I had some pretty scary weeks when breathing wasn’t…so possible, I guess that’s an accurate description. It felt like a 30 pound cat sprawled on my ribs so every breath was a struggle and unsatisfactorily oxygenating. It wasn’t so bad that I wasn’t getting air at all but it stank. The nurse made me feel stupid asking why I waited two days to call but I was working! And it didn’t seem like an emergency. Usually sort of broken, I can’t be dropping everything to run to the doctor when I feel awful, I’d have to move into the hospital! Anyway I was vindicated when the doctor declared it another mystery because I wasn’t actually suffocating. It just felt like it.
These days, I’m grateful for being able to breath fully. The little things are great.
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The Roku experiment continues apace. No real complaints other than the occasional hiccup or freezing that may be blamed on the internet.
I love my Roku…i actually have 2. The box one and the USB one…I never have issues iwth the box but the USB drives me crazy. It kicks me out of my account all the time. Which shouldn’t be a big deal…but who remembers user/ids and PWs? No one!
Interesting! I had wanted to use the USB one and I can’t remember why I chose the box instead – perhaps because the box had better reviews? I’m glad you mentioned it because now I feel better about going with the box – I HATE remembering usernames/PWs for things like this.