Anonymous Mess

We make the progress. Slowly. Creditor Interest Rate Owed Amazon Store 26.49% -556.24 Chase Visa 26.49% 0.00 JetBlue 22.24% -95.92 Chase Amazon Prime 18.99% 0.00 Barnes and Noble 16.24% 0.86 Chase Slate 13.74% -75.00 Chase Freedom 18.99% 0.00 CU Signature Visa 2 11.24% -429.15 Bank A Signature Visa 11.15% 0.00 HELOC 8.50% -86,631.68 CU Signature Visa 1 8.40% -827.49 Car loan 2.90% -42,720.98 Bank A Balance Transfer 0.00% -3,746.58 BankAmericard Platinum 0.00% 0.00 BestBuy 0.00% 0.00 Citi Diamond Preferred 0.00% 0.00 CreditFirst (Firestone) 0.00% 0.00 Lowe's 0.00% -526.05 Total CC Debt -6,255.17 All Debt -135,738.20 The Great Job Search is off to an unsteady start... still, it's a start, right? Had lunch this week with a friend I haven't seen in months. She's been plagued with money problems since I've known her, partly the result of unwise decisions made from ignorance and emotional need. She told me she'd been working with a financia...

I just spent $640 on a new monitor. Not this one precisely, but you get the idea Cue PF Frugality alarms: Alert! Alert! Unplanned purchase! Funds diverted from debts still outstanding! Activate guilt shields! Criticism incoming! Yeah, I'm cowering. I know, I know. Why spend $640 that you (broadly speaking) don't have when you do have a functional, if aging, monitor and you're trying to get out of debt? Because unfortunately, "functional" isn't quite good enough. I work from home roughly once a week, and Spouse uses my monitor when on call at the new job. At work, we both have dual, (reasonably) high-res monitors, because our employers understand our workflow has us moving between applications throughout the day.  To illustrate, in my usual work at the current client, I am checking/have open at a minimum: Specification documentation, usually Excel or Word An integrated development environment app, mostly for the display aspects of my work ...

Spouse got a job, a gen-u-wine, paycheck-generatin', benefits-havin', full-bloody-damn-time job! With a salary nearly equal to the previous, City-based position! Win win win for the Spouse! It starts in a few weeks. And then joy will spread across the countryside like melted butter, dripping into every crevice, as we start to beat our debts over their filthy heads with the valorous shovels of income and frugality! Yes, I'm giddy.

I could've sworn I left it right here .... It was a bit of a blur, between interviews and getting a new contract (yay! paycheck for a year!), trying to gather tax information (why did I schedule tax appointment for February 1?), and several new bills and obligations (boo...hiss... sigh). The contract is with a large employer in our city, and is located close to home -- I could take the bus if necessary.  The work is... a stretch. I'm having to use long-abandoned skills, and learn new ones, and while the client seems satisfied at two weeks in, I have moments and sometimes days of abject terror, wondering if I'll ever navigate my way through and get up to speed. This is only my second contract, and a major client of my agency, so I really feel pressure to not just do good, timely work, but to impress, maybe to wow.  Spouse maintains I'm my own worst enemy, none of it is beyond me, etc., etc. I have noted, however, that Spouse does not suffer from measured, bal...