Biggest Fail Ever??

Hey, remember how I had such high hopes for my first cash-only month?? Well, I crashed and burned, folks. And not like, crash-my-bike-and-scraped-my-knee crash, more like the-plane-fell-out-of-the-sky-in-a-burning-ball-of-flame crash. I ran out of cash for the month last Sunday... and just. kept. spending. It's like I blacked out or something for the last month, and am only now being shown what happened. I mean what was I doing? I'm currently about $135 over budget for the month, which may not seem like a lot, but when you realize it's over 10% of my monthly salary... ack. And the worst part is, it's all on food! I was trying to keep track of my cash to see where it was going, and of what I remembered to write down, this is how it went:

$33- Random snacks (Gatorades, candy bars, dairy queen, etc.)
$92- Meals (at restaurants or fast food)
$28- Breakfast (gotta let the boy stop convincing me to go to the Waffle Shop every Sat morning)
$13- Part of a Halloween costume
$6- Used books
$4- A puzzle

So there you are folks-- I never really realized just how much of my "Fun/Entertainment" money was really just spend on eating things! I don't even have anything to show for it (not even extra poundage... thank goodness for small miracles).

I'm so frustrated, but I can't let myself get too down. Just gotta watch better this month and try harder not to be so loosey goosey with my money. It's just gonna be hard because I'll have even less money to work with. But let's hope October is looking brighter...

Where Should I Get My Tattoo?

I've been like a madwoman in the past few weeks, participating in study after study. I got my brain electricity read (NOT fun), did a word memorization task (kicked butt!) and also visited some random webpages and then filled out surveys. From doing these three studies, I ended up with a fresh $51 in extra cash! As I said before, I *heart* easy experiments that pay you. And there are so many of them to choose from!

And what might I be doing with that extra money? I got quoted for a tattoo today... fifty bucks! Remember how one of my goals for this year was to get my second tattoo? Here goes! I didn't make an appointment yet because I still have to figure out some details, like what exactly it will look like and where it will be, but it's awesome that their minimum is only fifty. I am thinking of a small little sun somewhere, to remind myself of Italy. I'm thinking on my ankle, or maybe on my side under my arm. So I'm opening it up to you guys for ideas- do you have any ideas of good spots for a sun tattoo?

Happy Birthday to My Car!

My car turned 1 year old last month! I should have a birthday party for it, one year is such a big birthday. ;-) I can’t believe it’s already been a year. And the great thing is, I only put 7,2600 miles on it! I’m under average, which is excellent, which means less wear and tear on my car!

And you know what else is cool? How much of my loan I’ve paid down in just one year. $1,774! Granted, it’s a 0% interest loan, but still, it’s cool to see that much progress on it! Not nearly as depressing as my student loan, which pretty much never even budges despite all the money I throw at it.

September = Cash Only (Kinda)

Alright, here we go! Today marks the start of my very first "cash-only" month. I've never done this before, so I'm going to start small and just use cash for my Fun and Miscellaneous categories. That's where I overspend the most, so we'll try this and see if it helps. But that means I'll have $195 in cash just... laying around. It seems weird to have that much money out at one time, even though that's what I did in Italy for the whole summer. Guess it's different with dollars since this isn't usually how I roll here. But anyway, good luck to me! And good luck with all of your budgeting adventures for September too! :-)

(In other news, it. is. so. HOT.)