And inhaling, and exhaling

I was driving home the other day and I saw a truck with spinners on it. A thought came to mind as I pulled away from the red light, that we are such a spoiled country. I want you to think back, back say ten years ago, when spinners were popular, when your biggest complained in life was that gas was $1.50 a gallon (which was outrageous), a movie ticket for a 7pm show was $8 (which was outrageous) and you spent all your spare time customizing your Myspace profile (which was, of course, outrageous). We, as a country, had so much money we invented wheels that kept spinning when the car stopped. How stupid was that? At the time, not at all. It seemed so necessary to show the other people you were in traffic with how much money you had. Now it just seems laughable what we 'needed'. Now, we're just happy to have matching hub cabs on a car that get's 30 mpg. 

Anyway, enough with the reminiscing. This week was brutal. That should be in all caps cause I felt like fifth grader stuck in a cage match with The Undertaker and The Rock. It seemed there just weren't enough hours in any of the days to get everything done I needed to get done. I blame Tom Brady cause I don't like him and I had to watch the Superbowl Sunday night instead of doing homework. It's an American social law, isn't it? If you don't watch the Superbowl, you will be shunned by your friends and your neighbors won't make eye contact with you. 


I spent most of the week playing catch up. I thought Monday night would be productive but I ended up spending most of the night on the side of the highway waiting on roadside assistance. The first hour's wait was for a nailed tire. The second two and half hour's wait was for a spare tire that lasted 30 seconds before coming off the rim. 


After giving bad directions to some friends who agreed to come rescue me, we waited together for the tow truck. I was towed to Hamm's Tires downtown Dallas (Shout Out!), paid for a patch and a broken valve stem and started wearily on my way home around 10:30 pm. Tuesday morning, I had a bit of a meltdown. Stress and lack of sleep overwhelmed me and the idea of getting out of bed seemed impossible. I didn't much for the first part of the day but sulked and pouted. 


After convincing myself to not only get out of the bed, I got out of the house and did what I had been putting off since I bought my car, the purchasing of new tires. After a trip to my friendly neighborhood Discount Tire, I apparently found the shadiest shop in my town to get an inspection done. I mean these guys were the least professional people I'd ever seen running a repair shop. They ignored me until they found outIi need actual work done on my car then they tried to flirt with me to get my business. You know what creepy mustache guy? That stuff doesn't work when you have teeth missing.


I instead of putting it in the heads of creepy pedos, I took the car to my trusty mechanic who always sells me the best parts for the car, not the best part for his profit. He told me the catalytic converter had gone out and I needed a new one. Seeing how this car was made less then ten years ago (and not in the 60s as I would love it to have been. It would also have to be a Barracuda, Charger, Corvette, Chevelle, or Camaro in that case.)  and it's inspection is up this month, I didn't have much of a choice  but to get the work done. 


This entire week has been full of me spending too much money and not getting enough sleep. I plan on fixing all that next week.

---

Saturday

Taco Republic: $5.95

Total: $5.95

Sunday

Wal-mart: Lunch food for the week: $19.72

Bistro B: Superbowl party food: $14.07

QT: $44.46

Total: $78.25

Monday

Hamms Tires: $20.00

Braums: Ice Cream (I was slightly depressed): $2.15

Total: $22.15

Tuesday

The Wave Wash: $7.00

Discount Tire: $541.64

China City: (Cause you need delivery when your car is in the shop) $18.45

Total: $567.09

Wednesday

Wal-mart: Mouth rise: $5.78

Ted's Automotive: $464.64

Total: $470.42

Thursday

Carenow: (From way back in Dec, they are just now sending me a bill SMH) $21.90

Office Depot: $7.62

Whataburger: $6.70

UTD Library: (Cause the printers on campus don't take cash) $10.00

Total: $46.22

TOTAL: $1,190.08

A Long, LONG Weekend

I still haven't fully recovered from my impromptu road trip to Austin. It's always a great joy to spend time with Jen and the boys. I especially like the oldest one. His jokes are corny but he'a a great guy. I'm glad he's feeling better, being sick for a long period of time, like 2011, can wear on the moral.

What I didn't plan on was not sleep for the last five days. I don't know if I'm just stressed out about school or life or what but actually falling asleep and staying that way for the past week has been an impossibility.  Yesterday I left work with vertigo so intense, it was making me nauseous. When I got home, me and my bed spent some much needed quality time together. After sleeping eight hours, I got some food and decided to watch movies until I fell back to sleep. Also I didn't account for my threshold of what is and isn't watchable bottoming out when I'm tired. I ended up watching two mediocre films that honestly never should have been made let along watched.

Both films had really good actors but they were giving terrible performances which tells you, bad acting isn't about the actor all the time. I mean Keanu Reeves gave a good performance in the first Matrix film and he normally can't act his way to end an awkward phone call. Anyway, if you are thinking about watching Death Race 2 or Men Who Stare At Goats, don't. The latter was watchable but fell flat at the end and the former was a huge mistake in being made at all. If I had IMDB'd the first one, I would have found that it was directed by the same guy who made that new Scorpion King 3 movie and you know if a guy is stuck making sequels to other peoples films, he has problems.

My spending was a little on the edge of out of budget but I reeled it back in. I even paid extra on my car last month as in addition to a road trip, I paid bills this weekend. Because I slacked on showing my  spending for the past five days, I'm going to catch you all up at once.

---

Friday
7 Eleven, Gas: $25.62
7 Eleven, snacks: For the road trip: 5Hour, cup of coffee, bear claw: $7.40
McDonald's, dinner on the road: $3.25

Friday's Total: $36.27

Saturday
Exxon Mobil, snacks: coffee, bear claw: $3.02

Saturday's Total: $3.02

Sunday
No Purchase (Yay!)

Sunday's Total: $0

Monday
Jack In The Box, dinner: 4 tacos, oreo shake: $5.27

Monday's Total: $5.27

Tuesday
Kroger Fuel, gas: $40.19
Hong Kong Market, lunch for the week: $12.53
Bistro B, dinner with a friend: $10.04

Tuesday's Total: $62.76

TOTAL: $107.32

Paid on car in Jan: $350
Total owed on Car: $5,363.42

I'm getting the hang of this now.

This day did not start well. I slept right through my alarm to the tune of an extra hour and fifteen minutes. I'm convinced that I would have slept all morning if my mom had not come in and woken me up. I don't think I'd ever gotten dressed that quickly before and I was only twenty minutes late to work. What was strange was another co-worker of mine  also missed their alarm this morning and was late. Weird.

Parts of this day happened in slow motion. The hour between ten and eleven AM took at least three hours to pass while the hour between two and three felt like fifteen minutes. Time, you are a cruel mistress. Anyway, I was so sleepy by the time I left for class I was sure I would be napping through the entire thing. To my pleasant surprise, class wasn't boring. Wellllll, the first part was but after a certain someone stopped talking things picked up and the discussion was interesting.

After class, me and a friend sat in my car discussing life, the universe and everything and after promises of departing soon we ended up at Jimmy John's unable to ignore our talking stomachs anymore. In my budget I worked in that I can eat out twice a week and this was the first time I ate out all week, I'm proud of myself.

I'll be going out of town this weekend so I might not get to blog about the next few days. I'll catch you all up on Sunday, okay? DFTBA!

Purchases:
Store: Jimmy John's:
Items: 1 Veto w/ everything and a cookie. + $.50 discount for being a student (Woot!). $6.71

TOTAL: $6.71

Day Three. Seriously.

I need a new umbrella. The rain and wind and years has worn out my $3 IKEA golf umbrella. At least I need the umbrella I bought last week to be delivered so I can retire my $3 one. On the drive home I told myself I should research how to repair an umbrella but when I got home, what was waiting for me on the front porch? My much anticipated packages from Thinkgeek.com!

Now before you call foul and try to take away my two disc special edition of Casablanca, I ordered these items with a gift card I got for Christmas. No money out of the bank means no punishment. The one item I really could have used for the last two days was my super cool umbrella I ordered. Because I'm a proper film geek, I got this one:

Can anyone tell me what movie this particular item was in? Don't cheat and look it up! Oh you're just going to Google it anyway so I'll tell you. Blade Runner. One of my all time favorite scifi social issue movies. Cyber punks and androids who don't know if they are human or machine, what's not to love?  The only thing about getting this umbrella TODAY was the rain had stopped by the time I opened the package. Is it selfish for me to want it to rain some more so I can use it tomorrow? 

In other news, I came straight home after work even through I really, really wanted to stop at Target and see if they had jewelry on sale. Hooray for will power!

TOTAL: $0

Day Two, I Mean Three

I meant to write this yesterday but grad school takes up time. So does life so some of these post might be half a day late. Anyway, I was prepared to write about how this week would probably be boring when it came to post and I would probably end up talking most about why I decide to blog about this goal, the history of why I made this a goal, etcetera, etcetera when yesterday morning I opened the ridge and discovered I had nothing for lunch. It was a good thing my friend Kate gave me some leftovers, which were amazing by the way, or I would have to eat my snacks for the week for lunch yesterday. This would have left me snackless and prone to making bad choices when it came to spending and eating.

After school related meetings which had me leaving campus around 7:30 I braved the rain soaked traffic and stopped by my preferred non-Walmart store to get something for lunch. I have had salad everyday for the past week and a half and was sick up to my eye balls of salad. Also, I have a confession to make. I hate salad. Well, I strongly dislike it. Rarely do I ever go anywhere and say to myself, "I could really go for a salad right now."

In fact I don't like cold food with the exceptions being ice cream and potato salad. Which means I don't eat pizza or chicken cold, I always get my sub toasted at subway and hardly ever will you see me chewing on ice. I'm just not a fan. At all. But I will eat food I dislike because it's good for me so for the past week and a half, I have eaten cold salad for lunch. When I was in the store last night, I decided I was shopping for chili. What would be more filling on a cold wet day, or rest of the week as Greg on channel 8 tells me, than a too hot to handle, literally, bowl of chili?

I located sed cans, grabbed three if them and headed to the checkout. On the end cap at the register, there was a bag of corn chips for $.89 so I grabbed those too. Frito pie for lunch?! I didn't resist.

I spent less than six buck and was feeling pretty good about myself. It wasn't until I heated up my can of chili today that I thought about the calories I would be consuming. If you don't pay in one way, you end up pay in another. I don't plan on buying anything else today.

Purchases
Store: Aldi

Items: 3 cans of Chili, A meat snack stick, a bag of corn chips

Total: $5.75

2012 Mission = A debt free me

What I have just below my monitor. Cause I need reminding.

People make new year resolutions every year, usually with no real intention of keeping them. They get caught up in the euphoria of new year and all the possibilities it holds. Everyone thinks this is their year. The year they get that dream job or meet that dream person. No one going into the year thinking, this year will be painful and tragic and I will be glad to see it go. If they do have those thoughts, they usually keep them to themselves, hiding them behind the canned answers they give others when people ask, "What are your resolutions this year?"

I can honestly say I don't make new year resolutions. I set realistic goals I wish to complete by years end. Some are carry overs from the year before as long term goals, others are born out of that euphoria of possibilities and lifetime desires I think are ready to become realities.

My goal for this year, to be debt free. This isn't a new goal for me, not really. I was debt free before I started school two years ago. The only debt I have now, besides student loans, is my car. I owe around $5,500 and have four more years to pay it off but I don't want to wait that long. I calculated that if I cut out all unplanned spending and follow my budget closely, I could pay off my car by the end of the year. And that is what I plan to do.

No more trips to the Dollar Tree for one thing and buying $15 worth of crap. No more going to Walmart for three things and coming out with six bags of stuff I do not need. No more good deals from Woot or Amazon Gold Box. If I don't need it, absolutely and completely, I will not buy it.

A few rules to help me stay the course

1. I will post every cent I spend on this blog. At the end of the day, I will post each item that I purchased and a total of what I spent. If I didn't spend any money that day, my total will be zero.
   
2. I will post how much I have paid on my car and the total that remains monthly. If I pay on my car more than once, I will post that as well.
   
3. If I do buy something I don't need, I will agree to a punishment to be carried out in the form of surrendering something of extreme value to a friend or total stranger. This something of extreme value will probably take the form of a favorite movie or book I own. Details about surrender to be worked out later.
   
4. I have previous agreements about vacation/ travel that I already committed to for this year. Outside of these plans I will not be traveling until my car is paid off.
   
5. Once I have paid off my car, I am not obligated to obey these rules. 

That's it folks. I think. If you have a suggestion, please feel free to voice it.

Ready. Steady. Go.

I almost forgot. I bought nothing today.

Total Dollars Spent: $0.

I'm still pretty shaken up

The semester is almost over and I think I made it out with three A's. It was difficult, the most difficult semester I've had since My last in undergrad. I don't think I have ever been challenged this much in the field of academics. I learn all about social research and just how research is done in general. I learn about cultural diversity and how it effects every part of my view on social classes. I learn about French philosophy and how much I don't understand it. I also learn about friendship and collaboration. How to develop an advanced idea and get it out of my head. I couldn't list all the lessons I learned right now because I can't remember them all right now. It was very production semester but I'm tired now. It's not quite over because I still have a paper to write but that's pretty much done. I was feeling really good about surviving the semester and making some new friends until this morning.

I got to sleep late because I was having one of those conversations I have with friend M (that's how I will refering to her from now one). You know the ones where you share some very deep things and then you feel really good that you have a friend you can share that kinda depth with. My mom came in my room and started talking before I was awake, she does that. I didn't really hear the first part and started to wake up around the, "your glove compartment is open, the light is on, and it wasn't that way last night." I soon realized I was going to have to go outside and look at what she reporting to me. I still wasn't coherant but I put on my house shoes and robe and went outside.

When I got there, the light was on, the driver's door was left open and papers where falling out of the glove box. I thought maybe my brother went in the car to get the insurance papers, why he would need them I had no idea but that was the only idea my foggy brain could fathom. I walked around to the drivers door and noticed the ashtray was open, the compartment under the CD player [and all the items in it] had been thrown on the floor. I knew at that moment that the person who had done this was nobody I knew. I felt violated, taken advantaged up. I went in the house and laid in the bed. I need to feel safe and for the first in a long time I didn't.

I live in a relatively safe neighborhood or so I thought. Over the years, the demographic has changed. It was full of families with small children, now I'm not sure. I no longer know who my neighbors are and that is just as scary as someone rifling through my car and not taking anything because now I don't know if it was one of my neighbors who did this or someone passing through. I'm not sure how address this problem other then to make sure my car and house are locked up tight. I think this only adds to the problem dividing a community into individuals who don't know or trust each other. I wouldn't say leaving your house open all the time would be a solution to that problem but being afraid and never leaving isn't either. I guess I'm looking for a solution to keep from losing my community.