September Budget Summary

Guess what! I paid off my air plane ticket for Thanksgiving. I can eat again! I had been carrying a surplus from the summer months, $240. I was subtracting $100 every month when I had extra money and putting it towards the mortgage. Well, Since I got a raise in September, I re-worked my budget to include $1,400 a month. That is an additional $100 from my budget surplus and $100 from my raise. Now my October payment has been planned for so I don't need that extra $240. I already had $160 in my travel fund so the ticket is covered!

It did help a lot that my only extra spending for September was $8 for a windshield repair kit and I only spent $72 on food by eating what was already in my pantry and freezer. I'm going to have to buy more food soon but I might be able to make it through October. This weekend I am going to try the farmer's market for the first time. It's only open on Saturdays from 9-2. I usually don't get out of the house on Saturday mornings and if I do I am going somewhere else and the market is closed by the time I come back. This Saturday it is my goal. My own tomatoes and squash aren't producing and store bought produce is, well, blah, so I have high hopes for the farmer's market. I'm hoping for good food, good prices and something to make my ramen noodles a little more exciting.

I Dream Of A Shipping Container House

After I pay off my mortgage and get all the travelling crossed off my list, I want to build some sort of permanent dwelling. I've researched all sorts of houses, strawbale, adobe, SIPs, Rastra, cob, wood, metal, cement block, earthship, and now...shipping containers. Many people have played around with the idea. I haven't seen a finished house in real life yet just drawings and pictures. Some are connected together, some stacked, some single. I just saw another article about them on CNN, Shipping container houses.

My idea is to bury one. Yup, I want to bury one. I like the idea of an earth-bermed home here in Arizona. It seems like the cheapest way to regulate the temperature and maybe avoid the need for air conditioning at all. After all, the cave down the street maintains a nice 68 degrees year round. If I bury my house I should stay cool too right?

A shipping container would appear to be a perfect choice for an underground house. It is very strong, made of steel, and is just the right size for one person (or more if they get along well). The dimensions are 40ft. long, 8ft. wide and 8-1/2 ft. tall. I'm living in a 35ft. by 8ft. RV right now (with two 3ft. slide outs for the couch and bed). I think a shipping container would be quite comfortable for me.

I drew what I think it would look like:

I added a greenhouse area so I can grow plants and get a lot of light in if I want to. Ok, I know, that's going to make it hotter inside.

There are a few other things I haven't figured out for the utilities. I would like to have solar power. I don't know how much that would cost exactly, I have heard $10k or more. I would like a small fridge, computer, microwave, toaster oven, fan, heater, lights, TV and a few outlets.

Hot water could be solar most of the year. I could still harvest rainwater off of the garage roof but I would have to have a little RV type pump for water pressure.

Most of the water could be re-used on the landscape through a grey water system.

Then there is the whole sewage problem. Sure there are composting toilets to eliminate the need for a septic system but they are expensive. Hauling a camping toilet over to the existing septic system would get old really fast. A new septic system would cost, I am guessing, $6k but if I have a backhoe burying my shipping container he might as well dig a hole for the septic tank while he's at it.

It would be really easy if I could just bury my RV. Its all plumbed, wired, furnished decorated and everything. I can't imagine what the neighbors would think about that!

Here's some more links on shipping container houses:
Bob Vila visits a company that makes large homes out of shipping container skeletons: Bob Vila video
and here is a neat interior picture of student housing

I would love to be able to set up a container as a storage unit on my property first and then turn it in to a home later. That would allow me to empty out the mobile home and have someone haul it away. I think the county would make me get permits for the entire project though. That means more money up front that I don't have and I would need to hire someone to help get the plans approved.

Here's the estimated costs:
Shipping container: $2,000
Delivery and set-up: $1,000
Permits: $1,000
Foundation and ground work: $3,000
Modification for doors and windows: $1,000
Water system: $1,000
Electric system: $1,000
Septic system: $500 to $6,000
Total: $10,500-$16,000

Oo..oo..and here's my version with 2 shipping containers side by side. You know how construction projects go...always growing.

So, I will just dream, scheme and plan until I get my mortgage paid off. That's hopefully only 2 years away.

Dare I Go Fridge-less?

My refrigerator choices are:

my unreliable RV fridge currently running on propane
or my mini-fridge with it's non-freezing mini-freezer
or my old non-frost-free fridge in my mobile home.

Then I ran across this article Life Without A Fridge from Path To Freedom. Basically, they live in Southern California and don't own a refrigerator. I used to live in So. Cal. so I know the weather is a bit milder than here in Arizona. They also live within walking distance of a grocery store and pick up food daily. I suppose I could go to the store everyday and only buy enough for one meal. Perhaps I could utilize canned food more. I think the cost of electricity is cheaper than the cost of daily groceries. I can just imagine what I would buy if I went to the store everyday. I'd probably buy those pre-cooked meals from the deli. Plus, buying meals everyday would mean a lot of extra packaging and trash for me. I don't have one of those environmentally friendly stores on my side of town.

So, I'll stick with refrigeration for now. Maybe one day when I can scooter to the farmer's market or grow my own food I'll pull the plug and live without, but until then I'll enjoy my ice cream.

Ignoring My Chores

How's this for procrastination? Instead of doing my chores I am taking pictures and blogging about them!

These pictures are of all of my stuff (some good, some unnecessary, some trash) in my mobile home next door.

This is my "craft room" although no crafting actually happens here. It is just a place where all of my craft materials and art supplies live. You know, for that future masterpiece I will make one day when I have both time and money.


This is the kitchen/living room area. It wasn't always this cluttered. When I moved out of my house in a hurry last March, I just stacked everything in here and left it. I need to sort through it and throw out/give away/sell anything I can. It is still in the 90F range so I haven't spent any time in the mobile home. There are window air conditioners I could set up but instead I am just waiting until the weather gets cooler...any day now.


This room is the back bedroom that I use to store boxes of childhood memorabilia and other sentimental items, books, stuffed animal (yes, I still have them). The stuff in this room cannot be mixed with the stuff in the front room or else I will never find anything again!



So now you have seen the secret I hide from the neighbors. At least I hide it. It hasn't spilled in to the yard yet. When I bought this place there was a small pile of rubbish in the yard that I asked the owner to haul away before I bought it. Then, a few weeks after I settled in, one of the neighbors opened up his garage and dragged out all of his junk. If stayed like that for years. I wonder if he waited until this place was sold so he wouldn't scare away the buyers. Well, it worked.

Check Those Receipts

Oooo....Clearance! Yes, I did a little bit of grocery shopping on the way home tonight. Just some vegetables and milk...and ice cream. And then there was this big table with discounted items. I didn't think I would find anything but I did. I was getting low on flax seed oil and the price was 50% off. So I grabbed 2.

After roaming the aisles for my other items, I went through the checkout and the total seemed a bit high. I went all the way out to my truck because I don't like staring at the receipt while blocking the door. Anyway, the receipt said flax oil $8.39...you saved $2.10. That really confused me. The price on the bottle was $8.99. Did I pay $8.39 or $6.29? And weren't they supposed to be $4.49 each? So I left my ice cream in the truck and went back in to the customer service counter, annoyed that my shopping chore was not over. The girl said, oh yes, you have to be really careful about the items with the special tags. I thought, I have to be careful??? Why aren't the cashiers more careful??? She rang them up correctly and I got $8.43 back.

I am very glad I took a few minutes to check my receipt. Otherwise, an 'on sale' impulse buy would have been an expensive mistake.

Beans And Rice...Are Nice

There was a song about bean and rice that I remember from when I was young. It went...beans and rice, beans and rice...are nice. That's it. I think it was one of those public service information spots that was supposed to teach kids about nutrition. I guess it worked because I still remember it and I am eating beans and rice.

In my attempt to eat everything in my fridge and pantry I have gotten down to the canned goods. That means refried beans. And what can I eat with the beans? Yes, I have rice. I even have cheese, chips, and flour tortillas so lunch and dinner will be good for the next couple of days. I don't eat beans too often because, well, they don't really like me (you know...gas) and because it takes too long to eat a whole can. I'd say it takes 4 days of eating beans to get rid of a whole can. I just can't eat beans that many days in a row but every once in a while I will try.

Growing up (and even now) there were always bean leftovers getting green and fuzzy in my mom's fridge (sorry mom, I'm telling your deep, dark secrets). I try very hard not to let anything turn in to a science experiment at my house (ok, the freezer food-sicles I just threw away don't count!). Beans are a challenge for me but I am determined to eat them before they get green and fuzzy. If only my cat liked beans...

So, while our government is trying to figure out how to deal with the messy economy, I will save my pennies, pay down my mortgage, live below my means and eat beans and rice because that is that slow but sure way to prosper in the end.

A Little Feel-Good Video From Vanguard

Human resources sent out an email to the whole company today telling us to go to the Vanguard website if we have concerns about our retirement plans. Here is a little Vanguard video to reassure us that everything is going to be ok.

Basically it says we should all do nothing. That is easy for us folks that have plenty of time before retirement. If I was one of the many people who were going to retire in the next 5 years, I think I would be worried. I am one of the youngest people in our company. There are many that have been there 40+ years. Not to be pessimistic or anything but it seems to me that if you work in to your 70's and all you've ever done is sit behind a desk you might not have the health and longevity to make it to your 100's. Still, that would be a good 30 more years of retirement to have to pay for. I would hate to work until I was 70 just to use all of my savings on a nursing home.

Anyway, I will do what Vanguard says and do nothing except continue my monthly investments. I think my money is diversified enough so that I don't have to worry...let's see...401k mutual funds-not doing well, individual stocks-not doing well, real estate-not doing well, undeveloped land-not doing well, collectibles-not doing well, coin collection-um, hey, I think my coin collection hasn't gone down in value. Oh wait, the dollar has weakened. Hmmm, maybe I should go buy some gold bars. I still have a job. Those are becoming pretty scarce. Right now my job is my most valuable investment. Funny thing is, it's also the thing I want to get rid of the most.

Another Bill Arrives...Will It Be More Or Less?

These yearly bills are always so exciting. I just can't wait to see if my budgeted amount will be more or less this year. Ok, so it's not really that exciting. Usually the bills go up. Occasionally, the car insurance bill goes down and the car registration decreases ever so slightly.

Today the insurance bill for the RV arrived. And the verdict is...it went up. 33 cents. That's 33 cents a month. Not too bad. I wonder why it went up at all. They give me the option of paying in full or paying in 2 installments with a $7!!! service fee for that convenience. Um, no thanks. I'll pay it all at once. I can also pay by credit card which is nice because I can get cash back. It is only 1%, that's $2.95. Hmmm, I could buy lunch at Taco Bell or ... put it towards the mortgage? Decisions, decisions.

I Couldn't Resist...I Peeked At My 401k

I wasn't going to look at my retirement fund. I didn't want to be depressed. But I just couldn't help it. It was around the $70k level 2 years ago when I got laid off from my job. I logged in to the website and the total was...$67k!

Wow, I thought, that barely went down at all. But then I looked closer. My new job has a retirement plan with Vanguard, just like my old job did. I didn't ask them to, but they now combine my 2 accounts in to one statement. Soooo, while my balance is $67k, that includes $4,000 that I have contributed from my new job. Bummer. Looking closer at the statement, my account was at its highest point 2 years ago at $73k. Now that account, without my new contributions is only worth $63k. I've lost $10k on paper. But I am still contributing and possibly buying in to some great mutual funds right now. I am sure things will turn around and when they do my little funds will soar.

When The Economy Gets Shaky, Stick To The Plan

I try not to dwell too much on the news. I can't control much of what is going on. The best thing I can do is to stick to my plan...no extra spending, pay down the mortgage, keep my job, keep expenses low.

Another week of work is about to begin and I have a bad attitude. I have to keep reminding myself that it is my job that will enable me to pay off my rental house and retire early. That will only happen if I don't quit early.

Here's what I did this weekend to amuse/frustrate myself instead of spend money.

I attempted to complete my airbrushed flames project.


I wasn't completely happy with it so I watched the Flames video again and ended up painting over it and trying it again 3 more times. Now I am completely frustrated. I had to stop before I tested the motorcycle tank cover's aerodynamic abilities. Maybe I'll try again next weekend.

And now for my usual chores. I filled my RV water tank with filtered rainwater from my collection tanks.


I did my plumbing-less laundry by hauling buckets of water to my washing machine.


I used the wash water to water my baby trees.


I defrosted my freezer and threw out all of the ice blocks that were once edible food.

Before:

After:

Now I know exactly how much food I have. I thought I had a lot more but frozen shriveled hamburger buns and veggie burger ice blocks from last March really don't count as 'food'.

My RV fridge seemed to be cooling well at first. The freezer side freezes but the fridge side hasn't dropped below 50°F. I was just thinking how nice it would be to have all of my food in my RV instead of half of it next door in the mobile home. I could use the RV freezer and ignore the fact that the fridge side won't get cold or I could shut it off and go back to the way it was with my freezer food next door. What I am not going to do is pay the RV repairman $80 to show up and $70/h! If I have to buy a new RV fridge on the day before I sell this RV then that's what I will do (we are talking about over $2,000 for a new one). My mini fridge works just fine for now.

Extra Post

I'm a little slow at trying out the extra posting features available so I'm really just messing around while I wait (still) for my fridge to get cool again. At least the ice is gone. I gave it a little extra help with a hair dryer.

Adventures In Defrosting

I was highly motivated yesterday. I made a list of all of the chores I have been putting off and even got out of bed BEFORE noon today to begin. I checked my email for my ebay payment, which was there as scheduled, packaged and labeled my box and headed out to the post office. Once there I found out the post office moved across the street...guess it's been a while. Mailed my package and went home to start the rest of the chores. Then I realised...it's going to be another HOT weekend. 95°F That means the chores I had hoped to do in the mobile home are not going to get done.

All is not lost though. Heat is good for defrosting the fridges. Unfortunately, I didn't think ahead. If any of you remember from this post my RV fridge died back in March. I was able to get a free circuit board replacement because I had the same problem less than a year before. But because the first circuit board replacement cost me $800! and the second replacement still cost me over $100 in labor, I turned off my RV fridge and bought a $50 mini fridge that sits on a table next to the RV fridge. I use the RV fridge as a pantry now.

I still needed my old fridge in my mobile home, which is probably a horrible money hog, for larger items and for the freezer space. 5 months later and there is a glacier growing in my mobile home fridge. The mini fridge freezer section, which didn't work well anyway, is frozen shut and the temperature in the main compartment has been rising. Both fridges are in desperate need of defrosting. I plugged in the RV fridge so that I can transfer all of the food but I should have turned it on yesterday because it is terribly slow to cool. It doesn't help that I keep checking it :)

I haven't bought a newer model fridge for the mobile home because it is very inconvenient to go outside and in to the mobile home whenever I want something, although ice cream is a motivator :) I don't want this arrangement to be permanent. When I decide what my future housing arrangements will be, then I will know what to do about my multiple fridges.

So I am posting while I am waiting for one fridge to cool. Then I can unplug the other 2 and try to contain the mess that will most likely follow.

My Ebay Goal Is Not Getting Off To A Good Start

I listed 5 items last week and disappointingly, only one sold. The collectible cars just aren't selling now and the fact that it costs $10 to ship them is a big deterrent for people. Perhaps I will have better luck selling them on craigslist or at my spring garage sale. I originally intended to sell the cars at the local swap meet but I'm a big scaredy-cat when it comes to doing new things like that...it's part of my ISTJ personality, really. Plus the fact that I don't have anyone to give me a bathroom break makes the swap meet seem unattractive. It is also depressing to sell my treasured possessions for really really low prices. People just don't have the money to be buying extra stuff right now. I wonder if I should just hold on to it for a little while until people start buying again...or is that just an excuse to hold on to my stuff? Ah, I have an idea! Everyone is getting a Nascar diecast car for Christmas! Unfortunately, no one in my family is a Nascar fan. Now if they were footballs...

I have a few other items that might help me reach my $500 goal. An expensive watch that I won and a brand new water heater that I never hooked up. I have a copy of Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace book too. I watched one sell on Ebay for 99 cents. That's not even worth the trouble. Perhaps I should give it away in a contest on my blog. At least that would be fun!

Should I Cancel My Life Insurance?

Jacob at Early Retirement Extreme asked me why I have life insurance after I posted my $700/m budget. The reasons I have life insurance are perfect examples of how emotional money can be. The easy answer is that, no, I don't need life insurance. I have no dependents except a cat.

Here's why I bought it:

I have two 30 year term policies, one for $100k and the other for $500k. I bought the $100k policy because I was debt free, didn't have any other financial goals at the time, and I thought that maybe I would get married and have kids in the next 5 years and the premiums would be cheaper if I got it when I was young and healthy. 30 years would be plenty of time for the kids to grow up and by then I would have enough money anyway and wouldn't need life insurance. That policy costs $11/m.

Then, for some reason I can't even remember(it probably had to do with the fact that my sister died young and left 2 children without life insurance) I wanted MORE insurance so I got the $500k policy at $36/m to replace the $100k but I never cancelled the $100k policy. I pay the yearly premium for the $100k policy and every time I do it I think I should cancel it, but I don't. The $36 premium comes out of my checking account automatically so I don't even think about it. That's $47 total a month!

So, 5 years later I am not married and I don't have kids. I have thought about a trust fund for the cat but how much money does she really need? If she lives 10 years more (she is 8) I think $10,000 could keep her in the lifestyle to which she has become accustomed. I have also thought that it would be cool to leave behind college funds for all of the nieces and nephews. But really I would rather be alive than leave them money. They'd probably take it for granted anyway.

What do you think? Should I cancel both policies? I need affirmation!!! :)

Got Fed For Free Today

Just when I decided to buy essential groceries only and eat everything in my pantry and fridge, I get free food. Too bad this free food isn't reliable. One of my co-workers bought giant chocolate chocolate chip muffins. It is hard to believe but I have never had a chocolate muffin before. I prefer apple or blueberry. This muffin was very good but I thought it needed frosting. That would make it a cupcake right? Can I eat a cupcake for breakfast?

Another co-worker brought me a tuna lunch pack, you know, the kind with crackers and a little pack of tuna and mayo. I did mention not buying food until Thanksgiving to her(I was joking, kind of). I'll save the tuna lunch for later.

Then, at lunch, I was too full from the muffin to eat a frozen dinner, which is what I brought so I just had carrots. Another person offered me some of his homemade gumbo. He likes to trick me in to eating spicy things but he promised it was not spicy. It was actually very good. It tasted a lot like the red beans and rice I make, except without the beans and with chicken and sausage. I asked for the recipe. The ingredients didn't look too expensive, maybe I can add it to my frugal meal plan.

If this kind of free food keeps up I won't have any problem making it until Thanksgiving without groceries!

Sometimes You Pay For It First And Find The Money Later

I did it. I went ahead and bought a $402 airline ticket for Thanksgiving. I could have waited but then I would stress out about the prices going up and the flights filling up and I would check the prices every day for the next month I and would probably end up paying $500. So, I bought it now. $402 seemed like a reasonable price from Arizona to Washington.

Now, where to find the money. I only have $161 in my travel fund at the moment with no new incoming cash on the horizon. In fact, I had just cut back, twice. Once for the extra $100 for my mortgage and the other for my property tax bill. Hmmm, I could take it out of my November's extra mortgage payment but no. I won't. I hate to subtract on my mortgage spreadsheet. Only more money can be added!

My biggest adjustable budget category is food. How about no groceries until Thanksgiving! Ok, that's a little much. My tomato plant is dead and my squash plant isn't looking very good. I had better learn how to prepare cactus. I am going to try very hard to eat all of the food in my fridge and pantry. I just threw out carrots, lettuce and chicken that went bad too quickly. I can do better! I have only spent $20 on food this month because I went shopping at the end of August. If I eat everything that I have already I think I can cut my food bill in half. That would save $50 a month for Sept, Oct, and Nov. With the travel money I already have that leaves me only $91 short. Maybe I can do better than $50 a month. I see a lot of rice, beans and cheese in my future for the next 10 weeks. Right now that doesn't sound so bad. But when I get to Washington I think I will be very happy to eat anything else!

Selling Off The "Stuff" Is Hard To Do

I have begun my second $500 Ebay challenge. That's where I force myself...I mean "challenge" myself to sell $500 worth of stuff before November. I was almost successful (that's the nice way of saying I failed) in June. I sold $450 on Craig's List and Ebay. After that I lost my momentum. Last weekend I started slowly by listing $50 worth of stuff on Ebay. I'm going to have to try harder to reach my goal this time because I don't have big ticket items like my sewing machine and serger that I sold last time. I did find a Movado watch that I won at a raffle. I checked on Ebay and I might be able to get $180 for it. I haven't listed it yet.

Today there was a post on getting rid of stuff at The Simple Dollar. How timely. I am doing some of the things he suggests like using Ebay and Craig's List. I do plan to have a garage sale in March went my renters leave. I can briefly use the garage and driveway to get rid of the junk that isn't worth my time on Ebay and I want to sell the house furnishings too if there is anything left to salvage. After that I'll rent it as an unfurnished rental.

And a little story about emotional attachment to stuff. ***Do Not Read Further If Your Are Squeamish, You Have Been Warned*** I have mentioned my dear little first car a few times. The pack rats have chewed the wires, nested in the wheel wells and used the interior to throw wild parties. I cleaned the nests out of the engine compartment and sprayed it all down with Lysol. Then I place rat poison around and even put some Bounce dryer sheets inside because I heard the rats don't like them. Well, when I was doing laundry yesterday I smelled something bad. I walked around the garage sniffing and was dismayed to find the smell coming from inside the car. After obtaining a flashlight I located a large dead rat on the floor of the back seat. He was nice enough to die on a dryer sheet so it made the pick up a little easier.

So, why do I keep this car which is now just a hotel for pack rats and their friends? Because it was my first car and I want to fix it. If I sold it now I wouldn't get much money for it. Some day I will have a couple thousand dollars to get new upholstery and new wiring. I just can't get rid of it when it looks so sad. Yup, emotional attachment at it's worse.

Property Tax Bills Arrive, Time To Re-Balance The Budget

Well, I just posted my nice little $700 budget and then I got my property tax bills. These are the bills for the 2 pieces of vacant land that my RV is sitting on. Last year the total was $811.47, this year $936.07. Dividing by 12 months that's a $10/month increase.

Now, I know that I am paying an additional $120 that wasn't in my budget last year but I have enough cushion in my savings to pay for it. I just add $10/month starting now to my budget. I had to subtract it from my misc. fund. That means I have $10 less a month to buy stuff I want...like food :) But really, I just see it as more of a challenge. Groceries are the one area where I often splurge, like for ice cream and cookies. I could do more baking for myself but I just don't do it. Now maybe I'll start.

1 Little Leak: 1,075 Gallons Down The Toilet

I checked on my boss's house today. He's been travelling for 3 weeks now. He said the water bill was a little high last month which made him worry because a few months ago he had a major water leak while he was gone. I looked around the house and everything looked ok until I went in to the second bathroom. The toilet was running. You know that sound, the trickle of water leaking out and the continuous hiss of water as the tank tries to fill. I tried a few adjustments but they didn't fix the problem. I think it needs a new flapper. I decided to shut the water off behind the toilet and let my boss deal with it when he comes back.

I went outside and looked around the yard. The waterfall for the pool was on. I wasn't sure if that was supposed to be on but he has a pool cleaning service so I didn't bother messing with it. I did fish dead mouse out of the pool. That was just icky.

When I went back inside, about 15 minutes later, I checked the toilet. The back had drained. Hmmm, I'm guessing it is a low flow toilet and it might hold 1.6 gallons of water. 1.6 per 15 minutes is 6.4 x 24 hours x 7 days a week = 1,075 gallons a week!

Gee, if I had a water source that gave me 1,075 gallons a week I wouldn't have to conserve rainwater anymore.

Anyway, I filled 17 old iced tea gallon jugs with drinking water so I am set for another two or three months.

Chores For The Weekend

Ahhh, Friday...finally. Now for the chore list! It's pretty much the same old chore list because I don't get anything finished. I need Saturday to catch up on sleep and basically be a slug. Then I start thinking about starting a project on Sunday and then it's Monday again! I miss my 3 day weekends from my last job :(

I definitely need to put more duct tape on my homemade swamp cooler cover. It has rained a lot and I don't want the water leaking in to the mobile home again.

My trash has been piling up. I should make a $10 trip to the dump but I keep thinking that I need to sort through my stuff first so I am sure all the trash is together. I miss regular curb trash pick-up. I could get it out here but it costs around $23 and I would have to put it in my truck and haul it to the end of the road anyway. If I'm going to do that I might as well keep driving to the dump. At least I can drop off my recycling at the library for free.

Then there is the ebay stuff. Yes, that's right, I still haven't listed it. The cat's not for sale, she is just practicing her modeling skills.

My boss is out of town and I volunteered to check on his house for him. A few months ago he had a water leak while he was gone and it did about $40,000 in damage. All of the lower cabinets, furniture, carpet, and lower drywall had to be replaced. And then he found out that mold wasn't covered on his insurance. It cost $4,000 out of pocket for the mold certification. Anyway, while I am there he said I could fill my water bottles. That's good because I am almost out of drinking water. I have been buying Iced Tea in gallon containers and they aren't recyclable so I use them for fresh water. I'm going to have to stop buying them now. I have too many and I don't know what to do with them. I hate to throw them in the landfill. So, since I won't buy that ice tea any more, I'll have to make my own. That means I'll be using more fresh water. But a gallon of fresh water is cheaper than a gallon of tea especially if I can keep getting the water for free.

Resisting The Digital TV Switch

I get my television stations the old fashioned way, thru an antenna. Only 6 stations come through but it's enough for me. This week, the channel I watch most disappeared and another channel has been having sound problems. I thought it might be my antenna so I hauled out the ladder and checked all of the connections. They looked good so I waited a few days. Today the station was still missing. I decided to pull out my digital-analog converter box that I bought last spring with the coupon from this site.

I hooked it up after I bought it but I didn't really like it so I put it back in the box for later. Sure, the reception is better and I get more public broadcasting stations so I can watch educational kids shows all day long but I didn't like that I needed 2 remotes, one for channels and one for volume. I also didn't like the delay when I switched channels. It has to scan for a signal for each channel. I'm a channel surfer so that is very annoying. I know, I don't have many channels to surf but I can still surf them!

After I hooked up the box I got my lost channel back. I was curious so I searched for info on the web and found this from the local news site FOXAZ.com:

A major equipment failure at the KTTU-TV transmitter has knocked out the analog TV signal for KTTU My Tucson-TV 18.

While handling the equipment failure at the transmitter the KTTU My Tucson-TV 18 signal transmission to Cox Cable provider was down for about an hour Tuesday afternoon, but currently any customers who receive their television signal from Cox, Comcast, DirecTV, Dish Network or the off-air digital signal will be unaffected by the analog transmitter outage.

Customers who have not yet made the transition to DTV in time for the February shutdown will experience a KTTU My Tucson-TV 18 outage for an unknown period of time.

Work is currently being done to try and salvage the damaged transmitter, but the extent of the damage and length of time to repair the damage is not yet known.

Customers who rely on the analog signal may be able to make a transition to the digital signal using a converter box. More information on the DTV transition can be found here.

I bet it got hit by lightening. Well, it's good to know I'm not crazy after all. I guess I will just have to start using my converter box a little early. I was going to hold out until the last day in February but since they've started taking my stations away I either have to convert or buy a satellite dish. You all know I'm too cheap to pay!

Cutting Down On Wants By Reusing What I Have

I really like my new cell phone. I like people to call me just so I can hear it ring. It came with 10 different tones. I've always just had a plain ring so having a musical ring is cool. So far I have resisted the urge to buy accessories. My old hands-free earpiece works with this phone. Last weekend I stuffed my phone in to my old phone's case because I wanted to use the belt clip. It works...kind of. My new phone is shorter so the velcro doesn't hook. I have to tuck the top flap behind the phone. It's functional. And yesterday I was thinking that I needed a leash for it. I was able to use the one from my old phone. I like to hang it on a hook when I am at home and since I'm not a purse person, my phone is the only thing I carry. It is easier to hang the phone on the coat hook in a public restroom than to put it down somewhere or risk dropping it. Eew.

I haven't figured out how to get around buying a memory card and memory transfer stick for music transfer yet. My sister has the same phone so if I went to visit her maybe I could use hers. There is a person at work who has the same phone but I don't feel comfortable asking them to use theirs. I found one on a web site for $3 for a card and $7 for the transfer stick. I'm worried I will get what I pay for, meaning cheap stuff that breaks quickly. Maybe I'll go visit my sister before I go on my next plane trip. I really only want the music for plane trips. The rest of the time I can listen on my computer, except when I go for a walk. I'll see if I have any money left this month.

I noticed, as I emptied the RV black water tank that the hose has many holes. I really need to buy new hose or better yet, some PVC pipe so the sun won't eat the plastic again. Hmmm, music accessories for my phone or sewer pipe? I know which one sounds more fun. I only empty the tank once every 6 weeks, so I could put it off. Oh, that's terrible! My neighbors aren't going to appreciate it if the wind blows in their direction next time I empty the tank. Ok, ok, I suppose I can wait a little longer for phone accessories.

My $700 A Month Budget

For the curious, here's my budget. These are only monthly bills. Retirement, giving and extra mortgage payments were already doled out. See yesterday's post for that info. I hope to whittle it down even further after I pay off my mortgage to make the "Great Search For The Job That Doesn't Feel Like A Job" transition easier.

So, $700, here's where it goes:

$150 food**
$150 gas**
$37 car insurance
$41 cell phone
$47 life insurance
$70 electric**
$38 internet
$25 Christmas
$30 RV registration and insurance
$20 maintenance**
$68 property tax
$6 car registration and inspection
$9 mobile home tax
$4 AAA roadside service
$5 trash**

The ** means that I add those categories up and subtract my expenses as they happen. Sometimes I don't spend all of the food or gas money and I can use the extra for something else. I track my spending in a notebook. I like to wait until the end of the month if I need to buy something, that way I know exactly how much I have left.

The other expenses don't change much. Maybe a dollar here or there every 6 months. I re-calculate every time I pay the bill for car insurance or property tax to see if it went up or down and re-balance the categories. Eventually I will run out of money in my maintenance fund, which is the only category that isn't required. Then I'll have to increase my budget to **gasp**...$750???. I've kept it at $700 for quite a few years now. Moving to my RV definitely helped keep the expenses low.

Full Disclosure: Where My Money Goes

My first pay-stub is here with my raise included. Now I can figure out exactly how much extra I am getting. This raise puts me right over the $40k line...finally. I always thought of $40k as the starting wage for people who graduated from college with career oriented majors. I graduated from college but I was undecided about my career choices thus my major was in the liberal arts field. I went back to a community college after I got my BA in order to get a job skill. The skill I choose had a starting wage of around $11/hour. Not that great. I was incredibly lucky to land a job that paid extra for relocating so I was able to buy my property and house. But now I am back with a job that pays an average salary for this area. $40k is good for a single person. I wouldn't want to have to support a family on it.

Here it is:

$40,019.98
-$627.36 medical insurance
-$2401.10 401k retirement
-$7,425.60 state and federal tax
-$8,400 budget of $700 per month
-$4,002 giving and gifts
-$16,800 for mortgage $1,400x12 months

That leaves $364 left to be divided by 12 months. Ohhh, I can go on a shopping spree with $28 every month! (I'm being sarcastic)

This doesn't leave much room for, well, anything really. I have been very lucky so far. Any maintenance or repair issue in the past has cost around $25. I have been able to spread them out, one a month, or put them off. Let's see, there was the water filter episode $30, the mini-fridge $50, chipped windshield $8. I should buy a swamp cooler cover but I made one with plastic wrap and duct tape :)

I know things can happen and if they do I will just skip paying extra on the mortgage that month. But knowing that it is possible to pay off my mortgage in 2 years is incredibly motivating and much more interesting to me than going out to eat, buying new clothes, having satellite TV, or even living in a real house.

Rejuvinating The Wardrobe Without Ruining The Budget

I am a little bored with my clothes. I wear the same thing almost every week. I need 4 business casual outfits and one casual for Friday. I only have 4 pairs of pants and I don't like one pair (they are a little short) so sometimes I wear one pair twice in one week or throw in a dress. The dress always makes people say 'what are you all dressed up for?'. I wore the same dress last summer, they just forgot.

I decided it was time to give the thrift store a good going-through. Every few months I like to spend some time going through everything at the thrift store. I have to keep myself from buying stuff I don't need but if I really want something I let myself buy it. There was this ceramic dolphin holding a hanging dish. It was cute but I didn't need it. After I put it down someone grabbed it and put it in their cart. That made me want it but it was too late.(what an I? 5 years old? I just wanted it because the other lady wanted it.)

Anyway, I found 11 things that I really liked. I almost bought a pair of snow pants but they were too small. I want snow pants this winter because I'm going to be doing laundry outside in the cold windy weather and I want something warmer than jeans. Maybe next time I'll find some. It isn't exactly Fall weather here yet. It's going to be 100°F all week. They probably have the winter clothes in the back.

I got 2 pairs of jean shorts finally, now that summer is almost over. I bought a sweater too and then I remembered how hot it gets in the office in the winter. This sweater has a zipper so I can wear something underneath and take the sweater off if it gets too hot. Last winter I wore a heavy sweater and I was sooo hot all day. I got a pair of black pants also to replace my short pants. I still only have 4 pairs of pants though.

Total spent: $34 for 11 items. I felt like I did some major shopping and I added some new outfits to my work rotation. I used money from my budget that I have set aside for donations. I consider buying from a thrift store a donation because they use the money for the community.

Now I need to go through the closet and give away the clothes I don't wear. I'm running out of space and hangars. Closet space in my RV is at a premium. It's not like I can take over the closet in the guest room :)

How The Windshield Repair Turned Out

I did it. I tried out the windshield repair kit that I bought for $8 at the auto parts store. This is what it looked like to start with:


There were many steps to this process. I read the instructions a couple of times. I needed an hour to get through all of the steps and then I needed sunlight to cure the resin at the end of the process.

First I put on the sticker and base for the plunger, then the resin got squeezed in to the base and the plunger was attached.



I made it through all of the steps and then the sun went down. I checked on it later that night and it was still wet.

This yellow patch was supposed to help the UV light cure the resin. This morning I slept in late and the patch was stuck fast to the windshield.

After a mild panic, I was able to peel the patch off revealing a very ugly smeared mess. I was a little worried but the extra resin came off with a light scraping from a razor blade. The end result is pretty good. I would give it an 8 out of 10 for looks. I can still tell where the chip was but now it only looks like 2 small dots. Blends right in with the other bug splats.


The dots aren't that big in reality, they are just out of focus. I took 30 pictures trying to get a clear focus on the fixed crack. My camera just wouldn't focus on it. It was too small. I can't even see it in this picture:


The small cracks are visible if I look closely. Now, if the windshield doesn't crack for at least the next 6 months I think the kit will be worth the money.

The Great Mortgage Challenge-September Progress

Another month has passed and another month's rent has been collected. Yea! I deposited the rent yesterday and put in to motion the $1300 transfer to my mortgage. Next month I hope I can increase that to $1400 because of my raise. My new mortgage balance is...$57,248. Only 2 more years to go (plus or minus a few months depending on how much of my own stuff I want to sell).

The renters informed me that the garbage disposal died. I agreed to let them buy and install a new one at the labor rate of $15/hour. He said it would take an hour and he will write up an estimate for me before he does it. I have a separate fund for home repair so that little problem won't interfere with my own budget.

For those of you dying to know how my windshield repair kit worked...you'll have to wait one more day. I used the kit tonight but the sun went down too fast and I didn't get pictures of the final results. It looked pretty good though.

Got My New Phone Today

It's here!!! My new phone arrived today. I got my first cell phone 8 years ago and I never replaced it for one reason or another, mostly because it still worked. The other reasons included the high cost of accessories, having to change my phone plan and well, why bother? But when my music player broke I decided that it would be easier to just get a new phone with a music player instead of buying a separate one. Then last week the phone froze up and they told me that once it does that it means it is dying. Well, 8 years was a very long time. The guy at the verizon store had never heard of a phone lasting so long. I think it deserves to go live in a museum or something.

So, FedEx attempted to deliver my package yesterday. They called me wanting better directions. I asked them to deliver it to my workplace since they needed a signature anyway. It arrived this morning and I was excited. It is a nice looking phone with a keyboard inside. I must admit I spent a bit of time playing with it and reading the manual. I sent my first text message. It is a momentous day!

I didn't buy any accessories with the phone because I wasn't sure if the hands-free device that I have would work with it. It does! That's cool. I got that at the thrift store for $3. New ones cost $15 and up. I haven't figured out what I need to transfer photos from my phone to the computer yet. I definitely need a case. It doesn't even have a place to hook a leash on it. It's a little big to be in my pocket.


I was disappointed with the music player. I'm not sure if there is a way to get the music from my computer on to the phone or not. I can buy songs off of the VCast site but they cost $2. Songs from Amazon.com only cost $1. I don't want to have to buy new songs for my phone especially if I already bought them for my computer. There must be a way. Probably some other accessory that I have to buy. Oh, and since when do I have to buy games for $8 each? Wow, I am behind the times. There are a ton of games to buy. I think I will buy one game. I'll put it on my want list and buy it before I go on my next plane trip so that I have something to do in the airport besides stare at people. I was hoping it would have free games like phones used to have (but my old phone didn't have them). I guess I missed the decade of phones with free games.

The best things about my phone are that I can take pictures (even though it costs extra to send them to people), I love the speaker phone and the different ring tones for voicemail, texts and calls. I like the full keyboard. And I hope I like the music player once I figure it out. So, for a free phone (with my 'new every two' discount and 2 year contract) I'm pretty happy with it. Now, if it would only last 8 more years...