About sixteen years ago, I met him for the first time. My trainwreck sibling brought home this adorable puppy he had no business adopting because he had not one thing in his life that wasn’t a mess. I was furious at my sibling – he didn’t even take care of himself, how could he drag
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September 2, 2015
Total change from Jan 2015: 15% increase (2% decrease from last month)
On Money
I use Swagbucks to earn money for the household. My referral link if you like!
My brokerage is giving a $100 referral bonus right now, it’s usually $50. Let me know if you’d like a referral!
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As predicted, our summer fun was costly and our credit card bill came home to roost. I’m a little annoyed that we’ll have to pull out of savings but it’s a residual kind of annoyance, the kind that comes with knowing you were going to have to do a distasteful thing, then actually doing it.
***
Credit cards: I need about 40k more airline miles and I’ll be able to book domestic flights for the three of us for a nominal fee next spring. I was only going to book two adult tickets and have LB fly as a lap infant but it’s looking a lot like ze won’t be able to sit still for a 5-hour flight.
It’s a balance of taking the time to earn the miles and potentially not booking the ticket in time to get the award seats. Actually, thinking on it, we are both United cardholders so we should be able to book at least Standard awards as long as there are seats on the flights but I want the Super Saver award flights.
We’ve been kicking around several possible destinations for next year, we just have to narrow it down to the most likely.
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August 31, 2015
We are Groot! aka: y’all are wonderful.
Monday: Worked on our mortgage refi application which didn’t work out but I shall prevail!
Tuesday: Me: How about we retire in 7 yrs? PiC: Don’t get my hopes up. #SetGoals #1GoodMoneyThing gets you there.
Wednesday: Transferring money into brokerage acct. [BTW: TradeKing is giving a $100 signup referral bonus right now! Let me know if you want one.]
Thursday: Added $6000 to savings from a matured CD.
Friday: I think my #1GoodMoneyThing today’s going to be cooking up a new batch of veggies for LB. No buying jarred food!
Accidentally took Saturday and Sunday off, but we stayed at a friend’s house instead of a hotel for an overnight trip so I’m calling that our weekend #1GoodMoneyThing!
So many people have chimed in with #1GoodMoneyThing tweets. I tried to catch them all – it was harder if it wasn’t hashtagged because I’d have to see it real time and they fly by quickly – but you’re just knocking it out of the park! You’re not just doing it, you’re sharing it with new folks.
Now, look at y’all go!
@PhoenixStorm24 #1GoodMoneyThing for today would be buying smaller bunches of fresh fruits/veggies to stretch $10.
@civilwarbore Goat Lady’s Financial Tip: save $$ and keep your peace of mind by getting a dumb fridge instead of a smart fridge.
@accordingathena Let’s see, today I only paid for parking & worked my side hustle! #win
@accordingathena: Spent a ton at the mechanics with a quote for $3,000 worth more of work but used a $35 coupon for today’s repairs at least.
@femmefrugality: Cancelled the spa membership I signed up for yesterday in post-massage euphoria.
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@evil_bat_witch: @femmefrugality @RevancheGS #1GoodMoneyThing doing the same for cable bought for hockey reasons. Can’t record, won’t pay $20/mo for a DVR.
Mom Kristen @PhoenixStorm24: #1GoodMoneyThing for today: selling the second car seat!
Athena @accordingathena: Didn’t spend any money today. #1goodmoneything
Evil B Witch @evil_bat_witch: @RevancheGS #1goodmoneything got all 4 of my scrips in 1 trip, instead of the 2 or even 3 i usually do:D
@windycitygal: I’m going to say my #1GoodMoneyThing today was only buying lunch instead of lunch + breakfast + snack. Was working in SF today.
@clareyfrey: Re-signed our lease at our apartment complex but moving down to a unit that is $200 less per month in October.
@imawindycitygal: Walked and took public transit to the office today. No driving, so no gas used. And I got more exercise! 🙂 #1goodmoneything
@NotSoSerene: About to go pay off my car loan 8 months early #1goodmoneything
@NotSoSerene: Because We need to see something encouraging out here, have one more #1goodmoneything #hardworkmakesithappen
@thenonconsumer: Stopped at Trader Joe’s on my way home & bought nothing more than toilet paper. Again, where’s my offing medal?!
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@NotSoSerene @thenonconsumer – it’s your #1goodmoneything and that’s something!!
@femmefrugality: Did street parking instead of the pricier lot. #parallelpark what’s up! #1GoodMoneyThing
@clareyfrey: @RevancheGS Now that we earn more than we did when he opened it, @FreyDrew converted his traditional IRA to a Roth. #1goodmoneything
Have you got more? Tell me more!
August 28, 2015
Our interest rate on the mortgage sucks at 4.8%. Because our HOA is engaged in some legal shenanigans and no lender will refinance a property with the exact scenario we’ve got, we weren’t able to refinance when rates bottomed out. My penny-pinching heart bleeds. Yet another reason to thank the HOA. I gave it another go when I found SoFi, a new lender that started out in student loans and recently branched out into mortgages.
I’d forgotten what our break-even number was, so I went searching for a new calculation at the same time. I’ve banked with Citibank for ages so had a look at their rates while I cleared out a checking account. They offered an overly simplistic way of calculating break-even: The typical formula for calculating your break-even point is to divide your refinance closing costs by the amount you’ll save each month with your lower mortgage payment.
For example, if your refinance costs total $5,000 and refinancing will save you $200 a month, it will take you 25 months to break even. If you don’t plan on staying in your house for that long, refinancing might not make most sense in the long run.
That’s shortsighted. Looking at the monthly “savings” misses the point which isn’t just to save a bit per month, it’s to save vast amounts over the life of the loan. And it ignores the fact that in some cases, you can choose to change the life span of the new loan to a shorter one (and probably should) which may cost as much or even more than you’re paying monthly.
That’s the case for us: I’m not going to refinance a 30-year mortgage for a new 30-year mortgage – that’s just going to add to the total interest we’d pay over the life of the loan. I’m looking for a 15 or 20 year fixed rate.
My application was quickly pre-approved but we only got as far as a rate estimate and then stalled. It was looking really good: 2.8% fixed for 15 years.
The break-even calculator cautioned me:
Change in monthly mortgage payment: Additional $29 per month
Um, really? We would happily pay an extra $29 per month to save THIS MUCH over the life of the loan. HAPPILY. 
The estimated closing costs, right before I provided documentation, stopped me short though: $10,000. Excuse me?? I shot off an email to them. After several go-arounds, that was revised downward drastically to “only” $3500 give or take, but underwriting said they wouldn’t (sigh) touch our loan for the same reason all the traditional banks wouldn’t.
Drat and blast.
I hadn’t quite started up mentally investing that extra $10,000 a year for the next 15 years that wouldn’t ultimately end up in the bank’s coffers by way of interest but I’d already gotten attached. Can you blame me?
August 25, 2015
Status: Flattened, with feet up. It’s the only way I can write, with the few still-functional fingers, when my hands, arms, shoulders, and back are racetracks for searing, electro-shock variety pain. After etching grooves deep in my bones, the pain creates a fatigue swamp, literally knocking me out for a few hours. By Day 5, staying conscious is an accomplishment. I spent Days 1 and 2 waking up from that haze wondering what the heck time it is and when I passed out.
Looks like I overdid it. Or maybe it was all due to fall apart right about now. I’m not sure. Navigating that balance between doing what you “can” but not taking on too much is like blindfolding yourself, spinning in circles, then trying to unlock the master lock of a door with ten identical knobs. With a toothpick. It’s a crapshoot. There are no reliable signals to follow.
Add to that, moderation was always a special sort of hell for me.
I want to do more. I know I shouldn’t actually do it but I always want to do more and usually telling me “you can’t” is like pitching a lit match into a hay bale and saying don’t burn. Before my pain became chronic, pushing myself was a treat.
When I walk a quarter of a mile, I want that next quarter. If I run a half, I want another half. That was how I worked up to my first mile under 8 minutes, was how I competed in my chosen sports, was how I fought my way up, professionally. I still remember learning about building stamina from my first great P.E. teacher. Youth was on my side back then too, but the regimen was sound. Performing exercise to failure (also known as: until you can no longer maintain perfect form) was the first of many steps to building strength and endurance.
“No pain, no gain” was my actual motto. Fool.
My body doesn’t respond to that tearing down of muscles the same way anymore. It doesn’t work normally anymore. It stopped being normal half a lifetime ago.
I was never a quick study, though heaven help me, I’m some kind of stubborn. At first, the trade-off for pushing through, even if only by 15 or 20 minutes, was “only” days of crippling pain. Later on, crushing fatigue joined the party. An afternoon running errands cost two days of bed rest. A couple hours of exercise cost a week of mobility. Three weeks, once, when I was particularly boneheaded. If -no, when- I challenge myself, push myself just another eighth of a mile, just another five minutes, “just another” crashes down around my ears. It becomes a choice to sacrifice all other life activities like feeding myself or bathing. It should have been obvious, but it still took more than a decade before I accepted it.
Having accepted that fact, now, it’s a whole other struggle.
It’s battling my own instincts to get up and get out because to do otherwise is lazy except that to do so is to hamstring myself because I’m down to my last Energon Cube. It’s trying to parse the muddled and confusing signals correctly so that I don’t cross the line, but “stay active!” How do you tell when enough is enough if sometimes you’re feeling as close to fine as I get, don’t feel like you’re overexerting, but only crash the moment you stop moving? What do I go on, if I can’t trust how I feel?
To make things even more confusing, once every several months or so, for a couple hours it’s like the sun is shining on me. I have energy and only medium pain, the fatigue has backed off and I’m like unto a Tiny God of Getting Shit Done. For those brief magical hours, anything seems possible. That’s not today’s problem though.
As usual, I’m not the only one who’s had a rough few days. Abby has, as have a few other friends. I call a do-over on a crappy wasted weekend!
August 24, 2015
I’ve been a little complacent about money lately. I don’t track our expenses down the penny like I used to. I pay our bills twice a month, some of them are automated, and that’s good. This saves precious time.
But! There’s room for improvement. (There always is.) And there’s always too much to do. So rather than waiting until I have a lot of time, I’m going to do a little money thing everyday. I’ll tweet it under the hashtag #1GoodMoneyThing and I’ll also share it here.
What’s a good money thing?
Almost anything that involves your money, in a good way! Simple as that. Doesn’t have to be a great grand event, doesn’t have to take hours. Heck, I’ll even include anything that’s good for your health since money means squat if you’ve got one foot in the grave!
Saturday: I started up researching refinance options again. Our mortgage is currently financed at 4.8% and that’s pretty high, but we’ve had problems getting any bank to touch the loan because of some HOA shenanigans. Time spent: 1 hour.
Sunday: Via customer service chat, I added PiC as an authorized user on our phone plan so that if I am suddenly incapacitated or I croak, he can manage the account. Time spent: 3 minutes.
Care to join me?
It’ll be fun! I’m going to try this for a month, and then maybe weekly. We can give each other ideas. Comment here or use the hashtag so I can add your updates to future posts!
August 21, 2015
This is a bit of a brain dump.
It’s Friday and on the one hand, holy crap, what have I gotten done this week?? I made it through 4 week days with unusual probably fibro-related brain fog and 4 bouts of my glucose levels bottoming out leaving me shaky, dizzy, and almost gasping for breath. Got some work done. Didn’t get any of my real writing done.
On the other hand, THANK GOODNESS it’s Friday.
I am grateful beyond measure for Fridays right now. This level of relief’s normally the sign to quit my job and move on, most people TGIF because work is so very onerous, but that’s not precisely my problem. I am at odds with my job, it’s true, but it’s manageable even when I take on too much. Usually I just power – or muddle – through but it takes more of a toll some weeks than others. This week more than last. Frazzled is not usually my thing and it’s usually a sign that something is twirling off the axis.
It’s the short break from being Juggler and Timekeeper Extraordinaire that I crave. There’s a sense, during the week, that every single minute has to be used wisely. During naps, between naps, I have to be Getting Everything Done. That go-go-go feeling is draining.
On the weekend, it’s ok to clock out of Mom duty and hand the Adorable Creeper over for a break. We can take turns, it’s not just a hamster wheel of work / child / housework / child / work / child / housework.
We didn’t do much on our weekends, in the pre-LB era, except when we did too much. I like that our weekends are a little more even keeled now. I like that I actually want to take small outings occasionally. It makes me feel human again. We went to the Ferry Building and you all know how much I love doing that. We might even go so far as to take the family to a little farm and meet farm animals. For FUN.
My days, since last month, are a little less hectic than before but they remain nonstop. LB needs a third nap now and that’s great. I get quite a lot done during naps and late into the evening but I haven’t made the time to work on my extracurricular projects as much as I ought to. I need to do more writing. A LOT more writing. I need to test some business ideas and determine my next steps after this job is over.
I do have time but it happens in bits and pieces so it’s not useful for tackling the bigger chunks of either project. The trick will be to figure out how to smush those bits together to make a usable large chunk, like the ends of soap. Until then, my anti-stress mechanism is, as always, planning so that’s where my little time chunks go. I research our next trip, our next investment, our next credit card.
Under the good news column, PiC insisted that I take some real me time, and I caved. So I’ll do that.
Also, I stretched out of my comfort zone agreeing to do an interview on Jessica’s podcast. It won’t come out for a while yet so now I have far too much time to think about how silly I sounded, or how much I rambled, or any number of things.
I blinked and it’s near the end of August. Did anyone see that coming? Before you know it, we’ll be into Fall. And into my birthmonth! I might take a leaf from a good friend’s book and celebrate all month. Low key, but all month, in little ways. Because why not?
Summer is winding down, are you planning any last hurrahs before fall rolls in?
August 19, 2015
Lots of friends have kids in our area and it seems like they all participate in the Scouts.
I love the idea of certain things about the Scouts (the learning to do things, whether it be wildernessy or civilization related) but I never participated in the actual activity myself so I don’t have any fond memories of that experience. From afar, it seems like a bit of fun but also a lot of work. That said, I also have specific objections to the idea of Scouts for LB.
Time, money, energy: let’s be honest, in the Bay Area, we’ll be doing well to live in a place where ze can get a good education and eat well every day. 🙂 We likely won’t struggle like I have in the past, but unless something major changes, we are by no means going to have a ton of discretionary income for extras. And personally, selfishly, I’m a bit antisocial most of the time, I don’t want to have to be part of an activity that I have no personal interest in.
Discrimination: I know there’s a difference between the stances of the Boy Scouts (who discriminate against homosexuality) and the Girl Scouts (who maintain an anti-discrimination policy) so that may inform my decision later but for the purposes of this conversation LB could be male and I’m not ok with supporting an organization that supports any kind of discrimination for any reason. We may not be LGBT but I see very little difference between the reasons for discriminating against those who are as the reasons given for being sexist, racist or age-ist; I’ve had a cropful of justifications for racism and sexism and ultimately, discrimination and the rationale for it isn’t something I want LB to learn is an acceptable practice. It’s one thing to decide that something isn’t for you personally but a whole other thing to impose that expectation on others.
Desire: If LB is anything like me, ze would HATE having to do Scouts. If LB is more like PiC, ze would enjoy it. The only thing I know about LB right now is ze eats like a fiend and gets into everything I want hir not into.
Getting back to the point, there are things I’d love LB to learn in a Scout-like fashion (concrete steps, earning merit badges to commemorate the skills or accomplishment, etc.) and I’ve been pondering doing our own little Family Scouts.
Focusing on things that ze is not likely to learn in school, and not arranged in age-appropriate categories, PiC and I could reasonably impart the following skills to LB in the first ten to fourteen years. Most categories would probably have to be broken down into 1-3 smaller subcategories in order for LB to earn any merit badges before the age of 10, though 🙂
Financial Skills (of course!)
Balancing checkbooks. Not because I expect LB to be using a checkbook but the idea of debits and deposits are really easy to understand in checkbook format
Setting up bill payment, automated and one-time only, and when to do which one
Understanding and explaining the composition of a paycheck. Explain who/what SSI is and how that works
Navigate online banking
Personal Finance Management
Saving. Saving first, then spending from the remaining amount
Investing and compound interest: When and how to invest, and why
Needs vs. wants
Budgeting disposable income
Identifying fixed expenses and learning how to reduce them, and why
Basic tax implications
Health
Staying active regularly and enjoying it
Maintain a balanced diet with all the good stuff and the good for you stuff
Compassion – thinking of others, within reason, is good for both of you
Don’t run with scissors, aka, basic health and safety
Cleaning and bandaging wounds
Automotive
Routine: Check your fluids
Change a spark plug
Clean your brake pads
Change a tire
Jumpstart a dead battery
Change a dead battery
Drive a car (manual and auto)
Drive a truck (manual and auto)
Parallel park
Parking on a hill
Household maintenance
Keeping appliances clean, safely, and in good working order
Keeping furniture clean and organized
Sew a straight seam
Doing the laundry for humans, canines, athletes (a whole other level of stinky)
Kitchen Patrol
Handwash dishes without wasting water.
How to load a dishwasher
Kitchen Tetris: putting things away efficiently
How to clean and prep most common fruits, vegetables, and meats
Cooking basic meals
Baking a decent dessert
Make a decent cup of coffee and tea
Keeping the refrigerator sanitary
Rotate and eating the pantry
Animal Husbandry (dogs or cats)
Clean dirty ears
Trim toenails
Groom a coat
Bathe a pet
Check and brush a dog’s teeth
Check skin and bandage minor cuts and abrasions
Feeding a regular diet and picking up after them
Differentiating between normal behavior and indications of ill health
Outdoors-kid
Safely build a fire
Efficiently pack a backpack
How to use and set up any of the disaster gear in case of evacuation: flashlight, thermal sheet bivouacs, prepping emergency meals safely (choosing when to use flame versus flameless heaters in case of gas leaks), etc.
Travel
Pack for a short trip.
Pack for a long trip.
Reading a map
Using public transit
STEM
Creative problem-solving!
Libraries are great resources
Now we just have to make some cool badges!
::Did you do Scouts? I know I missed other important stuff, what would you add to the list?
::What would you think is an essential life skill?