Ah, Hubris Last time this week I was feeling pretty rocking about our No Spend Month Prospects. With over a hundred bucks of our alloted $250 left, stretching the pennies to November seemed a pretty simple task. I was sure that if I could just stay away from the sushi we’d have this challenge in…
Frugality and Finance
Mini-Money Challenge: How Handy Are You?
My friend had a leak under her sink. Big puddle of water. They called the plumber, who quoted her $800 to pull and remove the leaking faucet and replace it with a new one. She related the story to me: “$800?! Are you kidding? That’s a lot of money! That’s almost a thousand dollars!” “So…
Mini-Money Challenge: Assessing Your Clothes Drying Habits
Your clothes dryer sucks your money away. After your basic HVAC, fridge and freezer it is the biggest and most expensive energy hogging appliance in your house. You are a NW Edible reader, so of course you know a clothes dryer is totally optional. People have, can and do line-dry their clothes 100% of the…
No Spend Month: Week 3 Wrap Up and At-Home Coffee Analysis
The giant canister of coffee beans we keep on the counter clinked empty early this week. Out. Of. Coffee. This is how most conversations before 10 am start in Seattle: “I’m not really up and moving yet. Haven’t had my coffee!” “Hey, do ya wanna go get a coffee?” “Um, could we talk about this…after…
Mini-Money Challenge: Occupy Your Brain (Why You Don't Really Want What You Want)
I had a dream the other night. I was working some corporate job and my boss lent me his car to run errands over the weekend. In the dream, I didn’t know what kind of car it was, and somehow Homebrew Husband ended up driving it to pick me up from this job. This was…
Mini-Money Challenge: Sell Some Books
I’m of the Erasmus school of spending: When I get a little money I buy books; and if any is left I buy food and clothes. As an example, these are some of – but not all of, you understand – my cookbooks: I have an equivalent number of gardening and house-maintenance books, quite a few big, heavy collections of…
No Spend Month: Week 2 Wrap-Up
Ready for the big No Spend Month disappointment? I totally succumbed to temptation at the thrift store this week. See, there was this mint condition, vintage, all-wood game of Labyrinth. Remember trying for hours to get that little metal ball past the fourth hole in the board? Or was I the only one dorky enough…
Mini-Money Challenge: Plugging Your Little Money Leaks and The Latte Factor
Everyone who talks about budgeting beats up on Starbucks and people who just want a damn cuppa coffee to help them get through their long, long day. Poor Starbucks. Poor Latte Drinkers. I get it. I live in Seattle, where we love coffee, we love Starbucks, and mostly we love to pretend to hate Starbucks…
Mini-Money Challenge: Earn $1440 An Hour With A Phone Call
When the hell did my internet bill become $80 a month? That’s not for some fancy bundled internet-TV-phone combo thing, you understand, although they would like me to do that (oh, yes they would!). No, that’s just for the internet service. We’ve been without cable TV and a home phone line for years. We have just have this one…
No Spend Community (Bloggers, Share Your Posts Here!) And Week 1 Wrap-Up
First things first: have you done the Own Your Financial Numbers Challenge yet? That might be the most important thing you do for your financial health this whole month, so if you’ve put it off, go do it. No really, we’ll wait. It’s that important. Phew. Okay, now that that is done, how ya feeling? Pretty solid? Glad…
Mini-Money Challenge: Own Your Financial Numbers
As I recall, Oprah, in one of her less-svelte periods, talked about “owning her number.” As in, admitting publicly that she weighed 200 pounds. Owning Your Number is not being scared to really look at your starting point. It’s about getting past denial. I consistently find the philosophical fundamentals of financial fitness and physical fitness are the same. One deals in…
Mini-Money Challenge: Wrestle More Money Out Of Your Largest Appliances
Once I was visiting my in-laws in Central California. We were driving through what used to be Ag Land but is now, inexplicably, where people who work in San Francisco live. I say inexplicably because this area is about a 90 minute to two hour drive from San Francisco depending on traffic. People explain why…