Poor accounting winfall

So, I have in the past purposely fouled up my accounting. I would enter $20 in the register when I really spent $17.63. My goal was to make sure that I always had a buffer, and so that I would never be without gas money or the like. Well, I guess that practice really added up. In fact, it added up to about $100 more than L and I owed on our credit card. So, I have traded extra security and liquidity for less debt. I've paid off our last credit card, leaving us still heavily in debt, but with more manageable debt. We still owe on the car and the student loans.

I can finally start putting a little money in savings without breaking the budget. Once I get us back up to a bit of a cushion, I guess the trick is to start paying down the car faster. Well, of course, we haven't seen one bill from the student loan folks yet either, but we will this year. I'm not enrolled this semester, and by the time June rolls around we'll have the double whammy of student loans and questionable income. Though, for right now, I'm going to revel in the fact that I don't owe visa a dollar.

Getting better

First, I have to say that this post is a blatant topic rip-off, or inspiration if you're feeling generous, from An English Major's Money. She was commenting how she thought things would get better financially over time. Not just idle hope mind you, but hope stemming from her excellent plan. By living frugally now, and building up what I would consider a sizable amount of cash reserves, she will be able to splurge now and again. Its a great idea, and one that is worth the effort.

As for our own efforts, I'm not sure. To live beneath one's means requires income, and hopefully steady income. L and I don't have that yet. We're working on it though. If she picked up the letter I solicited from a former professor today then I can apply for that long shot job. If I got the long shot job we'd be three steps from easy street. So, I should go out and buy the big tv right? Well, maybe I'll wait. I have to plan this lesson for my current job by tonight anyway, so I'll just keep plugging away.

Striking a Balance

Sure, we can't afford to go out right now to nice places. That much is clear. To make matters worse, our work and school schedules seem to place L and I apart from each other a great deal right now. Its very lame. So, while I was sitting around here watching internet TV again yesterday (I'm convinced I'm getting my money's worth from American Telephone & Telegraph right now), it seemed to me that I need to strike a better balance on going out and staying in. I mean, there are only so many netflix movies you can watch in at home before one starts to get the cabin fever. I think we're fast approaching this point. Ergo, I'm setting a goal of the cheap $20 date in the neighborhood this weekend. Thats right folks, the historians are hitting the town!

- S

Updates from the frontline

So, L started her teaching credential program yesterday. Apparently they made the students sit in assigned seats in alphabetical order. When I say students I of course mean L and her cohort. What kind of school is this? Learn by example? Their first assignment was to print out the school's handbook, hole punch it, and, as a group, decide how to divide it with those page dividers they made you buy in junior high. How excellent. To top it off it had to be placed in a 3-ring binder. I told L she should go out and get a name-brand trapperkeeper (an expense I know), and to write "school sucks" on it. That way when they came by to ask about it she could tell them that treating adults like children brings childish responses. The good news is that they're headed down to get their 30-day credentials on Thursday at the SDCOE, which should hopefully alleviate some of the income issues that come with yet more graduate school.

As for myself, I've gotten a couple of more sub days next month over on the island, and I'm using this week of relative inactivity to get ahead. Now, getting ahead in my mind is split between trying to get work in the much larger SD school district, as well as watching Jericho on the internet. I'm mostly done with the TV series. The internet.... what won't they think of next.

- S

Edited: How could I forget. Tia's theme of the week is money and finance. A good friend that Tia.

Is any of it possible?

So I'm sitting here watching the Chargers lose to the Pats, and it got me to questioning the possibility of turning things around. Are some things inevitable? Maybe, maybe not. The Chargers did just take a pick from Brady in the end zone.

What really got me to thinking was this article from Alternet. Its about the economy under the current administration. To make a long story short, the article suggests that if you're like me, a working person in their twenties, you may very well be on an unalterable path to failure. [Scifers punts, so they can't capitalize] The story goes like this... try to think of something the United States produces anymore. I mean, something where you could go down and get a job manufacturing it. Can you think of anything? I can't. The author suggests that we start developing alternative energy, medicine, infrastructure and other ideas. I'd like to see that. Presumably there are things this country can do well. Things that you and I can do well, if only we could afford to get it going. Thus I try to pay off the debt.

I don't know about you loyal reader, but I'm very concerned about the fate of our generation. It appears that the Babyboomers have been marked by mediocrity. What have they accomplished? What will we accomplish? Give me five years to get it all together. I'll let you know.

- S

P.S. Oh, and silver was up to $16.20 an ounce today. Amazing. Ron Paul might have a point.

The Two Job Phenomenon

Just to be clear, while two jobs for two broke historians would on average mean one job per historian, this is not the actual distribution of jobs. So, yesterday I began my long days of substitute teaching in the morning for some extra money and then racing up to the University to sit through the lecture that I'm on salary to sit through. Let me tell you it was a close call. The jr. high ends classes at 3:00PM and the University lecture is at 4:00PM. Your intrepid hero made it at 3:55. Whew.

Was it worth it? I'm not sure yet. The extra money is going to help pay down that credit card debt, which in the long run will save us money, or rather will allow us to save money. We also have to be honest, for all the cat wrangling involved, being a substitute teacher is a pretty easy gig. There is no boss in the room, no customers, no phone calls to answer, and at the end of the day there really isn't a quota to have met. So, its pretty easy stuff. Its just a long day that begins at 8:00 and ends at 5:00PM. I know what you're thinking, you're thinking "S, those are normal business hours." To you I'd say yeah, but I'm a teacher and an academic, and I'm not supposed to have to do things like that. Boo hoo for me. - S

Chasing rates

So, I was reading on another blog how Washington Mutual, a bank where I already hold accounts, will give you a 4.75% rate. Now, that bests the 4.10% that is given by ING. It sounded good. L and I need a joint checking account anyway, this savings account has to be tied to a new checking account, so it seemed win-win. I signed up, put in the info, and told them to transfer $100 into each new account from my current WAMU savings. Seemed great. Well, then came the questions. Who was my first born? Is Pluto a planet or a planetoid? Who holds your student loans? How much do you pay?
Okay, so I had trouble with the last two, and thats, well, troubling. Who does hold my student loans? I haven't seen any literature from anyone on those in years, and the ways I figure it, they'll be coming due some time in summer. Or at least I'll start making payments on that gargantuan debt. So, thanks WAMU for making me realize that I need to figure out what the heck is going on with, by far, the largest and most important debt to my name. Between L & I, these loans make up the majority of our debt. About $38,000 worth. Its scary to think I don't have the slightest idea how they work at all. - S

Learning valuable lessons

So, I decided the other day to role the dice with my meager retirement savings through the UC system just to see what would happen. Or rather with 44% of it anyway. I bought into a long range fund managed by the UC system, and it immediately lost money. I went from having $411 in my retirement to $409. Stupid stock market. Why did I choose to buy into a retirement based on stocks during the worst starting weeks for the market in 17 years? Who knows. What I did learn is that investing is a long term process. I'm already rallying. When I checked it today, it was up to $410.95. Yeah, I'm going to be on easy street. - S

First Post

I've been reading a lot of different blogs lately. Most about personal finance, but some just about the tribulations of making life simply go. I've always liked the idea behind a blog. A journal to record the brilliant thoughts and adventures of life, but with the ability to share them with the world (and of course by world I mean the 1 person who might one day stumble upon this web address). Mostly, it seems like it might be cathartic to publish the attempt of two historians trying to make their way in the world. Can we stay afloat financially? Can we get into Ph.D. programs within a reasonable distance of one another? Can we eventually get work in our chosen field? Who knows!?! We'll find out together - S