Quid, Me Vexari

I don't have to use it right away, this is true. I do have my goals stretched thinly at the moment, maybe because I'm breathlessly scrambling to catch up from daycare expenditures.

If I chose to be influenced by Liz Pulliam Weston, I would use most of it on the Roth IRA and the emergency fund.

If I chose to be alarmed by my home's dropping value, I'd replace the garage door or pay someone for weeding and mowing.

If I chose to be motivated by sustainability, I'd buy a new refrigerator, and a chest freezer, and some bicycle accessories.

If I chose to be rewarded by instant gratification, I would divide among the bathroom, garage door, and IRA contributions.

If I chose to be governed by the PC, I'd buy a new printer, personal finance software, firewall software, and a flat panel monitor.

Decisions, decisions...
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I have a garden. I mailed a cheque for $822.20.

There are supposedly lots of things we take for granted or are psychologically addicted to that we don't really need. Me, I like utilities: heat, gas, electricity, running water, indoor plumbing.

I like having a house to come home to. I like to put non-processed, non-toxic vegetable and animal matter in my mouth where the matter trickles down into my gastro-intestinal system. I like to walk outdoors, onto my property and pick up something that I'd have to wait in line for at the supermarket, have a "speshul membership card" for "speshul 4% deal" to buy.

I even like climbing into a large vehicle and zoning out while someone else drives me and sixty other people eight miles to work. I admit I also like settling into the driver's seat of a warm, covered vehicle when it is wet and cold outside and I have to be somewhere faster than a bus could be.

I like to cover my shoulders, elbows, torso down to my knees, and even to cover my feet. I like to stave off or slow down the physical deterioration of vital organs.

I like to show affection to my friends, and sometimes to my family. I like to redistribute a small percentage of my income to where it's needed more. To top it all off, I would like to have all of the above even when I am not punching the clock or earning a living. I might scale down from a house to an apartment or a "Golden Agers Eco-Commune" hut.

I am hoping then that we will have fewer people in the house, with smaller stomachs, and lots of free time so we can make gifts.

So scaling back is as difficult for me as it is for many other young families. Is there anything above that identifies me clearly as an "over-entitled American?" The transportation, clothing and entertainment costs are easy to cut back. The food and utilities: not so much. I could save on food if I spent money on sprouters, and jars and canning, and soil amendments and rental fees for tillers, and woke up in the dark with a flashlight and a brick to look for slugs, and chest freezers, and vacuum sealers. I could save on energy if I spent money on new siding, a new roof, solar panels, cistern, rainbarrels, a lean-to to store dry firewood. Oh, but there's that insurance thing to think about. It reminds me of the Dilbert comic: "Every item on this list is Top Priority except for Personal Life." My husband and I are trying to think of how we could scale back, wondering if we'll resort to our 1996 way-of-life (one-bedroom apartment, one car, no savings) in the recession. Except we didn't have Roth IRAs to contribute to, and we spent a greater percentage of our budget on food back then than we do now. We bought clothes at retail prices then, and the only apparel I buy at full cost now are undercarriage and shoes. We went to movies three times a week and now, maybe twice a month, we rent from an excellent video/DVD place, or watch stuff from YouTube. I am not ready for this recession.

And yet, I look at what we earn, how infrequently we shop for clothes or drive (still frequently enough to merit having a beater car on weekends), and wonder how to manage our goals of having the mortgage paid off before either one of us turns 55, a year or two of university education saved for the kidlet, while more or less having our expectations and needs met by one salary. I check the Consumer Expenditure Survey for my city for 2005-2006 and doggedly try to whack our expenditures to meet or beat what is spent by the average household unit in our area. It's challenging. The savings goals are to be met by the other person's salary. We're about 60-65%, rather than 50%, and I think some of that is due to food choices, technology we're not really dependent on, and our accelerated mortgage. And we should be able to afford insurance and bring that emergency fund up to six months, but no.
I failed the Kiplinger's Financial Fitness Test because I didn't have an emergency fund of six months' expenses. Truth is, I had emergencies! There's a lot I don't have.

Link du Jour: Five Basics for Building a Solid Financial Fut...

I'm thinking of using a fee-only planner through the Garrett Planning Network, after my retirement assets reach a certain amount and some of my short-term financial goals have been achieved. When I poke about for insurance I never know what is the best, or what to look for, I know nothing of trusts or estate stuff, and my spouse has a sizable 401(k) plan I wish he'd roll over into a noncontributory IRA. I also have questions about using a 529 or a Coverdell, especially when there's a possibility we may relocate out of the country.

I thought maybe one had to have an estate or net worth of over $500,000 to use a financial planner. Is my thinking incorrect?

My spouse noted at dinner that I seem to be the one getting the credit card offers. He didn't enlist in the Direct Mail Opt-Out Campaign, as I had, and thus he'd be getting four credit card offers from Capital One a month, but only the month before anti-consumer legislation benefiting credit card issuers would be law.

I received an offer from Chase today. The second surprise is that it didn't suck. F.I.A., formerly MBNA, would have me in the position of an abused spouse, believing that it had every right to refuse me 0% offers and APRs below 13% because I didn't deserve good credit--those installment loans for vehicles, over 100 months of mortgage payments, not good enough for F.I.A. I felt unworthy of having any credit card. But Chase is willing to offer me 0% until June 2009, and then a fixed APR of 8.99%. And my credit card issuer of twelve years isn't willing. How's that for weird?

I wonder what would transpire if I got some first-tier customer retention support person at F.I.A. "Hey, Chase offered me a 0% teaser for a year. Did you tell them how much I suck? The best you guys will offer me is 3% plus a 3% transfer fee for eight months. Any idea why they'd offer me a rate 4 points below the absolute minimum you'd give me?" "Doy, durrr.... we think our rates are more competitive. Black is white, ignorance is strength, slavery is freedom. Doyyyyy..."

Update/Correction: Chase offered 20-day grace period. So apparently I still suck as a credit risk after all.
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I'd been dwelling on our finances--I know, BIG SURPRISE--meditating on why we still can't afford lotsa stuff it seems the average American household has. Our emergency funds and retirement funds have had the same growing pains our incomes had. Our savings are still recovering from five-plus years of daycare...

Easy Money is Liz Pulliam Weston's new book, and I recommend it to people who need checklists or informed guidance on getting their financial ducks in a row.

Readers of this blog know I tend to obsess, and reallocate, and oscillate between panic and relief. They know that my most pressing schizoid problem is attempting to save for "the basics" and saving for "hard times."

The "hard times" crowd I run around with are big believers in gold, commodities, foreign currency, and selling the house.
That's fine when one's house is in tip-top condition. My house needs some love, and yet, threatened with an uncertain economy, I do not have the cojones to face down the stigma of borrowing against my house to improve it.

Anyhow, on page 126, Chapter 7: Buying Homes and Cars, Ms. Weston outlines her idea of how people should prioritize their financial goals:

1. Retirement needs to be a top priority.
That means contributing as much as possible to a Roth IRA and contributing 10 to 15 percent of the gross income.

2. Sufficient insurance coverage: health, life, disability, home, and auto insurance.

3. University education for children.

4. Paying off the mortgage.

Before reading that, my goals look more like this:
1. Home Improvement.
2. Sustainability. (Who's gonna buy my house when utilities are freaking high? How'm I gonna afford my other goals when my energy costs spiral upwards?)
3. Emergency fund.
4. Retirement.
5. Osaka.
6. Paying down the mortgage.
7. Replacement car.
8. University education.
9. Insurance (outside of what work covers).

Aside from Osaka and sustainability, I believe most items on that list are what ordinary (the bottom 80% of income earners) Americans have on their financial wish lists. I'm supposed to be saving 45% of our gross income meeting these goals -- eep! Time for me to learn to love the humble bean and shivering at night.

I looked at the Consumer Expenditure Survey for 2005-2006 and was surprised to see that every region suffered an increase of liabilities to assets in 2005-2006. Not so surprised to see the West's liabilities jumping up by $36K (quick! in what region can you find Stockton, Riverside, Henderson, Las Vegas, and Phoenix?)

I also saw some sort of map (believe me, I'm trying to look for the URL) today and noted that most northern counties in my fair state, plus Detroit's county, plus the northern tip of New Hampshire are the only border areas that have suffered moderately heavy foreclosures. Now, if you look at counties close to the other border, you see something akin to a crisis. Nobody wants to be near Canadians in their senior years, unless you count the snowbirds in Florida. I smell retirement home investment opportunity as climate change accelerates.

(No, this isn't a partisan post. Honest. Skim through the paragraphs, do you see any names you're sick of reading about in the newspapers' politics sections?)

The garden stuff might be finished up today. Hooray! Another cash balance step backward, yet one fewer goal to save up for!

Made a Roth IRA deposit today. A little larger than I planned, but I found a prepared check in my purse that required only my signature. Again, that merely means fewer dollars per week to meet the magic $5000 number.

I have a glimmer of hope, a crumb of opportunity offered to me, careerwise. I have to think of/prepare a potluck dish for a school event tonight, but inbetween prep steps I'm tempted to be a feng shui whirlwind and declutter my career center, get writer's cramp penning affirmations, preparing a "treasure map." Maybe I still have time to down a Red Bull and keep the sunny side up... can you put some reddish-pink cling film over your monitor for a few seconds so it looks like my dream is in the pink bubble of actualization?

Although I frequently look at my less-than-40-hour-work-week as martyrdom ("look! I'm volunteering! for the children! for the future of America! and I could instead be putting more in my 401(k), restaurant revenues, and in Washington's coffers!"), a "Should you stay home or work?" calculator indicated we're actually saving ourselves extra tax money by my limited hours.

1. Organic Food. For sure. I am a localvore, more or less, relying on foods caught, raised and grown within my state. The Food Labeling Act of 2006 has led me to distrust food labels on supermarket shelves -- it was lobbied for by at least seven out of nine food processing companies California Attorney General Bill Lockyer tried to sue two months before Rep. Michael Rogers of Michigan drafted the bill. Nobody in my family has an advanced degree in chemistry to help us ascertain how many additives or preservatives can be safely ingested or for how long to prevent cancer, and seeing as food is one of the few variables I can control for preventing cancer...

2. Lunches out.

3. Dinners out.

4. Hair. I was floored to read that most families spend under $60 for personal care a month. With careful budgeting, I can manage under $100. I believed that what I paid was the going rate for haircuts and hair colour because that's what the salons I went to were charging.

5. Internet and Cell phone stuff. I don't know how people develop tolerance for cell phone spam via texting or autodialing -- I can't fathom wilfully paying for such garbage. I look forward to the cessation of our contract.

Title in reference to my baby steps. I want to stomp stomp stomp like Dumbo on a fermented berry rampage through my financial plan.

I had some moments at the library -- for an academic exercise, because I can't afford to buy stocks and seriously, late November, after August and September's predicted volatility, might be a better time, I researched some large-capitalization blue chip stocks through my discount brokerage and through Value Line. Here's what looks good right now, if you're buying:

Microsoft (NSDQ:MSFT)
Coca-Cola (NYSE:KO)
Burlington Northern (NYSE:BNI)
Colgate-Palmolive (NYSE:CL)

I've been going through the budget repeatedly and I have noticed two things:
1. I spend too much at hair salons.
2. My spouse and I don't earn enough money. Some ex-Marine can get a job earning $8K after taxes, but I with ten years' IT experience net half that...

Liz Pulliam Weston argues that saving for retirement is a higher priority than building up 3-6 months' savings, and advises that a HELOC used only as an emergency fund would do while the retirement is being padded. This gives me some breathing room. I'd rather chop down the actual money in my E-Fund to pay for the bathroom, and shove more at the Roth so I can restart my 401(k) at 15% without forcing us to live on Top Ramen and Kraft Dinner (Kraft Macaroni and Cheese), than use the HELOC for planned expenses. One's a definite, one's a maybe. Rule in favour of the maybe.

I have a spreadsheet of savings goals. As I've just started saving for most of my goals many of them are just past the 10% mark. I had a specialty tea with some shortbread in the posh part of the city with a friend to commemorate my 10% milestone of funding my Osaka trip.

Our water consumption is up. I wonder how much of that is due to someone being home full-time, or from the garden setup. I set aside the greywater/re-use/cistern plan as I don't even know what's legal right now, and renters/buyers would care more about the garage door than "am I being sustainable?" Also, thanks to our wet and miserable winter and first half of the spring it looks like we won't have a water drought this summer.

A good friend commented that I had lost weight. It must be more than five pounds I've lost, as my friend is a straight male. He's known me since I was really thin. I hung out with my straight male friend today as my spouse is gaming at a tournament. At least my in-laws remembered and sent flowers today. I sent flowers to my stepmother, and my kid has actually been well-behaved today, as I greased my social gears and took some exercise.

I've decided that this year my charitable donations are to be divided between helping families living with cancer and families living with hunger. Go with what you know, right?

Apportioned $150 to the Save Yourself Account. I owe myself about $750 more to my Roth IRA judging from my pay advice. 10% of gross pay to retirement. Actually it should be 13% according to my spreadsheet, but I don't want to be in debt for the bathroom remodel. Because I know the minute I dip into my emergency fund for some non-emergency, an emergency requiring more than the full amount I had stored will happen.

I am also four mortgage payments away from being one-third through the principal paid on my home. The sad fact is that by then I'll be almost 40% through the term.

All these little drip-drip-drips.

This is a bonus. I unplugged the television and other peripherals downstairs.

The city wants us to discard our old refrigerators and get newer, more efficient ones. I may do this.

I challenged myself to come up with ways where I have saved thousands of dollars a year. Here are some:

1. We have only one car. Insuring, maintaining, fueling and paying for another car would cost us $5K.
2. My child grew out of full-time daycare.
3. We drive the car mostly on weekends, with two wee (5-mile round trip maximum) errands during the week.
4. Contributing 10-15% to 401(k) plans.
5. Refinancing has, on average, saved us over $4K a year.

Update: I enjoyed Heather Havrilesky's 4-18-2008 Salon article; there's so much I could identify with. Growing tomatoes, baking bread, buying food in bulk, making bean soup, shopping the natural food stores for bulk beans. It's worth reading the comments for some yummy bean soup recipes.

In my dark teatime of the budget, the DAYCARE years, I would dream about what I would do when the child went to school. Europe! Home remodeling! New car! Vacations! 18% retirement contributions! BEING LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE.

I didn't think I was ever living beyond my means, because I had been consumer debt-free for most of those years. I accepted vehicular and HELOC debt as consumer debt, short-term though they may be. I was also contributing 10-18% of my money to retirement annually.

I looked at my budget. A few years earlier MSN Money profiled a couple where we live going broke on $90K a year -- they adopted children from China and had car payments.
When one first tackles a budget, one records amounts that are comfortable and reasonable. Maybe a family living at twice the median income thinks it can get by on DSL Internet, three cats, a cell phone, extra to the mortgage. Maybe one family at that income level is heading toward bankruptcy.
Shockingly, $100K doesn't go as far as it used to even ten years ago.

And then the little whacks are the challenge. One thinks one's doing well because she doesn't have cable television, as long as she waits ten weeks between haircuts at the "good salon" and four months between hair dyes, or because she has cut by two-thirds her family's automobile gasoline consumption, even though gas has gone up to three times what it was when she first bought her car. And then one reads Easy Money and thinks: "okay, somehow I've got to manage college, early house payoff, a decent retirement, home renovation (the kitchen is an untouched 60 year old), disability insurance. Downscaling expectations can be tricky. Preparing for an era where food and energy are no longer subsidized means additional expenses: greenhouses, better windows, gardens, tools, rain barrels and aerators and insulation. How to budget all that in with feathering the Nest of Tomorrow?

So I'm rereading from my personal library for how to live on less: Living More with Less, The Complete Tightwad Gazette, Your Money or Your Life, Invest in Yourself, Saving on a Shoestring and Orchids on Your Budget: the latter is not a nuts-and-bolts "do math to make your income larger than your outgo" but rather a 1937-New-York-City-Vogue "Oh honey yes the money is gone but you needn't throw your chicness out the window"--amusing for its humour and for the recognition that even the lifestyle of having to let the maid go can afford crudites, taffeta, silk, satin, crepe and wool. I'll add this: there was a time, not so long ago, when people accepted their carless, TVless, and retirementless lives with joie de vivre.

"The Smart Poor do not pretend to be rich, which makes everything different. Once you give up struggling to fool people, you can have a lot more fun on very little money. You can live in a funny flat in a poor city neighbourhood or a remodeled barn in the country. You can go to cheap foreign cinemas (now we rent DVDs) and boast about it, instead of skimping in order to be seen at the Opera. You can hunt up bargains in clothes and rip off the gewgaws and--if you have the flair and the figure--look like a million dollars."

Really, Orchids on Your Budget presages YMOYL with this message: "The point, nowadays, is not merely to know the cost of a thing and whether or not you have money to pay for it, but to know whether it's worth the price to you."

It's a funny old world... the neighbours to the north and across the street from us have broken into their home equity piggy bank a few times -- their houses are valued higher than ours, but their mortgages and liens are higher than what our house is worth. I thought I was hard done by because I was choosing to pay for cars and home remodels (whenever they were below $10K, that is) in cash, which takes years to save up for, by the way, when you're saving for retirement, flying home to visit the folks who are too frail to fly over, college, daycare @ $11K/year, and an emergency fund. So my house looks like junk right now. Yet I have the most equity, both in terms of numbers and percentages, of the three houses. Sometimes it is a boon to have the junkiest house on the block. Let everybody else's remodel bring up the house value. The city is helping to prop up my property appraisal taxes with a public park, "condensed community cages" and "expanded commercial retail zones." I would also like a light rail station please.

Also, a sign that reality has set up a tent (yurt?) in my area: I actually have acquaintances whose house value is below what they purchased it for 22 months ago.
My home value has dropped too, but I'm choosing not to worry about it until a 40% drop happens.

My i-Bonds arrived today. I may put them in the Safe Deposit Box along with a deposit, if I have time tomorrow after banking.

I look forward to seeing the bathroom remodeled and paid for so I can catch up on the retirement and save up for the other home improvement projects.

Sent an Optional Cash Purchase cheque for 5.5 shares of GE stock.

Spent money on a small selection of starts at the Edible Plant Sale, and at Emerald City Organics: dwarf oregano, tarragon, one roma tomato plant and one Early variety; also valerian, geraniums (both edible and flowery -- the valerian roots are a nice herbal sedative for the nervous), spearmint, catnip, and one sweet pepper.

Judging by the starts and the weather outside this May day has been brought to me by the Vitamin letters C and D.

Reconnoitered the garden shed and found rose food, liquid fertilizer.

Also baked bread last night. Little by little. Can't bring instant self-sustainability to my little .18 acre.

The last time I felt this lousy was the week my mother died. Sure, I became a homeowner that week (no, it wasn't a "here Mother-the-giver-of-life, just sign your deed over to me, then turn around to imagine the bunnies on yonder hill"BLAM! situation, in case you were wondering), but I was thinking "wow, life is going to be harder for me. I only hope I'm up for the challenge." And sometimes I was not up to it.

Currently I don't feel up to what's ahead. I feel like I'm burying my future and my dreams. Maybe I'm on the despair step of the five phases of accepting death and loss. Maybe I'm being overly pessimistic. I thought perhaps after some major losses I could speed my way through the rest of them.

I made a list of assets and liabilities for this challenging environment. The assets column is longer than the liabilities column, and some of the liabilities I can work on to eliminate: e.g., not in great shape, anxiety-prone, lack of basic survival skills. The list made me a little happier. On top of that, two long-distance chums this week gave me hour-plus chats and roused me out of staring at the existential abyss, so life isn't all sucky. If I can make time for some savings, simple pleasures, friendships, exercise and some gratitude, the stress should abate.

What scares me is I don't know what's going to happen, and I don't know if what I have is enough to allow us to survive well whatever comes. If not, well, at least I don't have to worry about surviving past my retirement.

Maybe I'll get to acceptance sooner. Maybe having a plan and working that plan, on top of enhancing and improving my spiritual and community karma would be enough to channel my nervous energy.

Today I attended two gardening classes: 1-2-3 gardening and container gardening. I also went to a bathroom supply and showroom to investigate fixtures, sinks, surfaces and ventilation fans. Our meat purchase was today: we purchase meat maybe once a month, sometimes we skip a month. This purchase should last us two months.

I think I'm going to burn some incense, recite the serenity prayer, have some herbal tea, and distract myself with planning meals from the bounty in the refrigerator. Christopher Moore's Bloodsucking Fiends from the library plus some healthful purging of garbage should help too.

My MMA is down to 2.5%, bummer. I know there are online accounts -- I need most of my MMA available and liquid at present, owing to bathroom renovation.
What this means is that my best savings accounts right now are: my son's account (up to $500), the Save Yourself Account, and the house. Fortunately my credit unions and mortgagor are promoting the "let's talk about the equity in your house" deals... perhaps a raise to $40K in the HELOC isn't out of the question. My line of credit has risen by 20% though, without any prompting from me.

In happy mortgage news, I am twelve payments away from the point where I pay more principal than interest.

I may put more money toward General Electric's direct purchase plan: it's trading at a low, and has a nice yield.
Today I pretended my boy has a future and put $100 in his college fund, and I pretended I was going to live to see 68 and put $280 in my Roth IRA.

Since I used fresh raw milk and fresh farm eggs for baking the past weekend, my son has turned into the Bread monster.

"These are the best buns I ever tasted!"
"They're probably the best I ever made," I said.

Later:
"Hey, wait, these buns aren't from Ezell's?" (Ezell's is a local fried chicken chain -- very very good, so good even Oprah delights in them)

Later:
"You know what we should do, Mom? Bake bread!" I agree here. Commercial bakery bread is very costly here -- $4/loaf.

I'm not making this up. He is not typically complimentary about my food. In fact if it weren't for a teaspoon of remaining milk in his bowl in the morning, I couldn't tell you if he ate.

The contractor came over to talk about the bathroom: for our rinkydink retro matchbox of a water closet, the estimate came in to 60% of what I projected. Yes, I'm Rain Man in that I don't know what things cost, and assume the worst of any scenario.

It's mildly curious that so much of my working life is dealing with high-tech and beta software and yet-unpublished protocols, but I live in an old house and if I could swing it, I'd have a Victrola. I think the woman who owned this house before I did, and who lived here fifty years, just had her husbands (sequentially) add stuff here and there as they had the money, as we're doing.

For the codgers like me out there: Muppet Show's "Beaker" = Stan Laurel?

So I thought I'd try the Dave Ramsey Baby Steps, starting on #4. Except I have some problems:
• My brother expects me to be in Osaka to see him get married next February

Partial Solution: go solo and save 60% in projected expenses. Do I really want to bring a seven-year-old with me on a lengthy flight? Or rationalize that a once-in-a-lifetime combination of seeing my only surviving sibling marry in a country/continent I've never visited is very worth getting into a bit of temporary debt

• I have planned to update my upstairs bathroom, and would prefer not to go into debt to do it

Partial Solution: get into the mindset of "it's not really debt if I put half down and pay the remainder within six months, knowing that I have four times the remainder in my emergency funds"

• Distribution of the cash flow would be optimized if I pushed as much money toward the Roth as I can before my current contract expires -- it doesn't offer me a 401(k) plan, whereas I am instantly eligible to participate in the next contract.

Partial Solution: Start contributing $150/week to Roth until contract starts, then start putting 10% in 401(k). With the first thousand deposited into the Roth, increment the percentage contributed to the 401(k) by 1, and cut the Roth IRA contribution down to $100. It's harder this year, getting that extra thousand. Also, according to two retirement calculators, one at choose to save, and the other at MSN Money, I DON'T have to save 15% of my pretax income. I need save only 9.46%, so that lets me maximize my Roth IRA and lower my 401(k) contributions to 9%. The 15% must be for people who are starting fresh, yet still expect to see Social Security.

• I have gone over my budget several times, and whereas many people in reasonably-priced cities might gasp and point fingers at what we pay for in Gloomtopia, it is a considerable challenge for the overscheduled and underorganized to knock down expenses by 10%. I have to wait for the cell phone contract to expire, cats to die, garden yields to increase, boy to mature out of requiring supervision. I might even have to cut down on my health regimen.

Dave Ramsey doesn't know my life. He doesn't know how haphazardly I've hopscotched along the retirement/pay off home/big childcare/college funding/home improvement/energy savings mosaic of financial planning. People don't get married a whole ocean away, don't buy homes so antiquated Lucy Ricardo and June Cleaver would feel right at home in because that's all they could comfortably afford (3x gross income, mtg pymt 25% of gross) at the time (which was two years after the very best time to purchase in the 1990s), don't develop life-threatening pregnancy complications that later rob them of their eyesight, don't save up for replacement items and landscaping and sustainability and inflation all at once.
They don't parachute into environments where bubbles are the norm, nor do what everyone else is doing because they don't know any better or haven't ever had disposable income before.

I don't like debt, maybe I don't loathe/hate/despise it as much as Ramsey does. Maybe I've dipped into the HELOC, gotten a vehicle loan at 2.9% APR. But I haven't intentionally missed a payment, nor carried a balance on my credit cards since 2002.

Maybe when it comes to improving the value of an asset or leveraging for a greater gain I put down my mace and shield and learn to love my liabilities. Or do what I can to increase my salary this year. That might mean stop volunteering at my son's school.

I fear the myriad of financial goals means making difficult choices, or learning to prioritize/plan down to the hour my money-saving healthful financial moves and household activities. Sometimes I feel enmeshed in a web of my own devising, only I had thought everything I did was a good idea at the time, or thought I was doing the best I could. No. Taking eleven years to complete Ramsey's baby step #3 of building four months of expenses because I was trying to do #2, #4, #5, and #6 all at once in a frantic race to catch up to the middle class is not doing the best I can. Even if my net worth went up thirty-six times in those eleven years.

Ratios to Aim For:
Assets: Liabilities 4:1
Liabilities: Liquid Assets 4:1

Where I am now:
Assets: Liabilities 3.75:1
Liabilities: Liquid Assets 4.66:1

Recently borrowed from the library:

Ending poverty in America : how to restore the American dream -- John Edwards

Recently placed on hold at the library

Easy money : how to simplify your finances and get what you want out of life -- Liz Pulliam Weston

Gotcha capitalism : how hidden fees rip you off every day, and what you can do about it -- Bob Sullivan

It's not about the money : unlock your money type to achieve spiritual and financial abundance -- Brent Kessel

The retirement savings time bomb-- and how to defuse it: a five-step action plan for protecting your IRAs, 401(k)s, and other retirement plans from near annihilation by the taxman -- Ed Slott

Simple prosperity : finding real wealth in a sustainable lifestyle -- David Wann

Your complete retirement planning road map : the leave-nothing-to-chance, worry-free, all-systems-go guide / book -- Ed Slott.

I think the last one must have been mentioned in an article or on a radio program because I placed a hold on it three days ago and already eight more people after me have requested the book.

As I was getting eye vitamins and Emergen-C, I found an astrology book that offered a calendar of best, cautionary and stinko times for business transactions. April 28 and 29 are the last really good days for money investing decisions until November 26. Good thing I'm signing my contracts now. I'm not sure I believe in this stuff, but it can't be any weirder than "buy what you know," "dogs of the dow," "buy at low price/sales" or "buy at a low P/E."

Richard Jenrette, formerly of Donaldson, Lufkin and Jenrette, used astrology. I could look at his 1997 book Jenrette: The Contrarian Manager, and see how he applies the alignment of the stars. A different kind of chart reading other than technical analysis, I am sure.

This coming week I must steel myself for announcing my departure from my contract. I'm not worried about saying goodbye, I'm queasy about setting an end date.

I bought $2550 worth of I Bonds today from my credit union: I purchased this much because that's how much money I had earmarked for a replacement car. I have already an I Bond dating back to 2004 that is worth $1172, so that's why I didn't buy $1200 extra: I had been saving only a hundred a month for the car.

I also bought some Yen for my Osaka trip. Maybe I'll bake some bread this weekend. If it were not for the lack of planning and protein I could eat out of my pantry.

I need to look into tax planning. My goal is to keep the AGI at least where it was last year. I don't have lots of stock losses, real estate depreciation, home office expenses, alimony or suchlike to declare. Does anyone know if 401(k) and healthcare deductions cut down the adjusted gross income?

I'm feeling shaky/nervous this morning. The neighbour's dog barking as it was left alone for the fourth consecutive night (did you know dogs can bark at least eighteen times a minute for seven hours? Somehow their larynges don't wither or become raw, I wonder why that is) and some driver trying to make a left-turn into my six-year-old as my little one after looking both ways was walking in a crosswalk on a PEDESTRIAN SIGNAL are testing my compassion limits today. When one's paying $3.85/gallon to feed one's wagon, I suppose one feels some blood sacrifice is necessary. I feel ready to bolt/stay at a friend's house or condo. I wish safety, security, and quietude weren't too much to ask for. These things seem to come only with death, except for Mr. Chaplin's case, in which his body was stolen.

I paid $100.01 extra toward my mortgage. I've paid a whopping 17% of principal since 5 years ago.

I finally, after four years, logged onto my son's Coverdell account and found he actually didn't lose any money. His stock investment has returned 24.42% over eighteen months. His mutual fund has gone up 33% since I purchased five years ago. His savings account at the credit union offers 7.25% APR. Oh to be a kid again.

Does anyone know what it's like to have the "Midas steward touch" on others' accounts, but have not so much luck with one's own accounts? Yes, I researched the fund -- not passively managed, but still a good one with a low expense ratio of 0.52%, and the stock investment shared the theme of one of his grand passions at the time: locomotives.

I unplugged our DVD player, VHS player and television. I took out a book on Once-a-Month Cooking. We have very little meat in the refrigerator: ground beef, pork sausage, and salmon. We are considering alternative grains like spelt and amaranth. We already use quinoa and millet for side dishes.

I joined the Weston A. Price Foundation. Following the food principles will hike up my food costs and reduce my already precious free time as I venture into do-it-yourself fermentation, bean soaking, sprouting and broth making, but the health benefits should be worth it.

Link du Jour: Ode to the Inexpensive Bean

Link de l'Annee: The Snowball Effect of Savings -- from the Simple Dollar: looks like I can get a deep freezer now!

As a sort of birthday present, I gave myself permission to achieve 100% on two goals: the "Emergency Fund" and the "Summer Camp Fund." Designating these funds as fully funded will give me a sense of accomplishment and a feeling of abundance.

That F/T, permanent position interview isn't happening: the position has been withdrawn. Perhaps filled from within, or a reorganization has taken place.

I arranged for a written offer for re-enlistment and a little pay increase. The expectation of budgeting for one year's full income is satisfying. I still have an in-person interview to be scheduled for Thursday for another contract engagement.

I was a bad gashog elitist and drove my kid to school this Earth Day morning, instead of properly walking one mile with him. However, I did enroll in two Tilth gardening classes: gardening for beginners, and container gardening.

To gear up for the bus trek, I have a lengthy list of books on hold. Recently my attention has been called to people like Dorothy Day, Joan Chittister, and Simone Weil.

Lately the savings deposits and # of depositors have shrunk. Don't know if that's due to the combination of gas, heating, food, or taxes, or because, as one woman confided to me, she was watching the fortunes of the bank sponsoring the program.

We returned from Victoria, BC last night: great hotel, good weather, fun tourist jaunts. A tsunami of nostalgia hit me as we visited the Royal Museum of BC. Delights include seeing punk band D.O.A. immortalized in a "famous BC people" triptych, and hearing "Hockey Night in Canada" theme song played on a classical grand piano in the stately and gracious tea room of the Empress Hotel during afternoon tea service. OH YES.

Roses and books of the "don't worry/be happy" variety greeted us upon our return, but no Orcaboards for our raised beds. I'm supposed to call the delivery company and ask for a re-send. I'm piqued that the Orcaboards provider is situated 20 miles from our home and waited 2.5 weeks after my order to deliver them, however. This will delay my garden.

Also this week: contacting the contractor about renovating the bathroom, a phone screen for the full-time permanent position I mentioned last week, and an invitation back to the team I left in mid-February. This helps with budgeting, and now I feel comfortable planning for a kitchen renovation.

Link du Jour Eating Healthy While Keeping it Cheap

Over the past seven weeks it seems we have had regularly occuring big gotchas or unplanned/extraordinary expenses: the cats had their vaccinations and examinations all at once, with blood tests for the "geezer" cats (no cat is old to me until it is 12, and venerable at 15, and 'I can't believe you still have a pulse' at 18...); motorcycle V-belt/12000 mi maintenance; school auction; summer camp deposit; big taxes; 2006 tax penalty/correction; weekend away; garden set-up. Imagine a series of 52 unplanned "gotchas" once a week and you can understand how people get into debt...

What we've seen is that it's frighteningly easy to allocate $1800-$2100 of expenses in one week without ever setting foot in a car dealership's service department, casino or emergency room, nor inhaling cocaine. I did not write "spend" because 20% or more of that money goes toward savings, or realistically, planned expenses at a future point in time. Amy Dacyczyn ("The Frugal Zealot," legendary editrix of the Tightwad Gazette) and Vicki Robin might not approve of our lack of simplicity. They all seemed like good ideas at the time (support the schools, maintain your fuel-efficient ride, stay out of jail, keep the child educated and entertained without paying for a nanny, et cetera). However, Dave Ramsey might approve of our emergency fund, and Mary Hunt might approve of our separate savings goals or "Freedom Accounts".

A recruiter returned my e-mail today, asking if I would want to return to the assignment I had until February 14: sure, said I. If I don't score the F-T job, the contract position would help a lot with budgeting for the next twelve months.

And thank you, Lux Living Frugalis, for the warm birthday wishes! I feel very buoyant and happy.

UPDATE: Speak of the devil! I was at Brent Kessel's "It's Not About the Money" book discussion/signing and yes, there was Vicki Robin of Your Money or Your Life fame! She is taller than I imagined!

• Birthday present #1 across the miles: a LUSH Serenity gift box!
• Birthday present #2 was twice as good as I anticipated: two books ordered on Friday from NYC and delivered Tuesday to me.
• (Reheated from earlier post, because it still makes me smile): Invitation to apply for a F/T job, this time by a company unlikely to go under any time soon.

My birthday isn't for a few days, but I won't be here when it happens. Add an impatient six-year-old, and stir...

Not so hot: the heating bill. Last year's average temperature was 50F, this year's 44F average temperature @ $0.77/therm (plus taxes, delivery charges) -- $108.50. I swear the thermostat never went beyond 68F! No wonder few accept the idea of global warming over climate change. 44F temps in March are not going to woo the Floridans and Californians over to our territory... "we'll keep the hurricanes and earthquakes please. we don't need your gloom and volcanoes."

I'm hoping that the achievement of my short, medium and long-term goals will count among them. I was invited by a direct-hire placement recruiter to apply for a Program Manager position at a well-known company (chances are someone reading this is using at least one of that company's products -- I know I am just by typing this). That'd be cool: benefits, a chance to move and be a renter for awhile.

A new advance-lending franchise has set up shop on the arterial street just south of us. This would be the fourth one. Yes, there are more payday advance lending outlets on that street than there are Starbucks outlets. We used to have lots of mattress outlets, now they're outnumbered. I'm trying to imagine people going to payday lending places, then picking up a frappuccino and a Simmons Beautyrest. What would do well though, given the comparatively cheap real estate, would be a Subaru dealership for all the Legacies, Foresters and Outbacks parked outside those $511,000 houses on the other side of the arterial. (Yes, I live in a low-moderate area by Seattle standards because we bought a house that can currently be managed on a typical college dropout's salary/median household income.)

According to the monthly release put out by the Federal Reserve, outstanding consumer credit amounts on revolving accounts at commercial banks and credit unions have gone down since January 2008. Huzzah!

I went to the Green Festival for free, thanks to my local utility provider, and spent only $7.82: $5 for tastings of two organic wines and two organic beers, and $2.82 for a copy of Natural Home Magazine. I received a 6% discount because all I had for change was $2.82 and the vendor didn't have small bills.

Contrary to what my savings tracks might show, I don't drop big wads on just anything "green" or nifty doodads with marketing text promising me they'll save energy. I don't have a Prius yet, and for me, "green" can mean using secondhand items until they can't be used anymore or they find a better home, or making further cuts to consumption levels. My friend and I noted that so much of what was featured at the Green Festival still promoted consumerism. Political refrigerator magnets and T-shirts doomed to be obsolete in six to nine months; organic bibs; bumper stickers (the only decent one there was 'GET OFF THE PHONE AND DRIVE', and who knows for how long that one will be relevant). Socially responsible mutual funds (gee, no sign of an expense ratio on the brochures, wonder why that is).

For freebies: I did get some dried healthful cat treats (which only one animal would bother with), a shower timer to monitor the length of our showers, and some free samples of non-toxic cleaning products. Who's going to make her booth rental money back with a sign reading: 'Use Baking Soda, Lemon Juice and White Vinegar'?

I was hoping to see more solutions about rainwater catchment products and strategies: save and reuse the rainwater, cut down on storm runoff, reduce flooding hazards, save on insurance and local emergency services. These are the green initiatives I'd like to see, that (pardon the pun) widely ripple benefits and savings. Or the Kill-A-Watt appliance -- I'd have paid money for one of those.

For the next three weeks I'm going to experiment with shutting my PC down after use, and even cutting down my home use. We'll see if there are noticeable savings. The other big savings for my electric bill would be replacing the refrigerator and the clothes dryer -- both probably at least 25 years old. I'm not in so much a hurry to change those.

I am penitent from last year's tax error. The fear of making another error and getting audited is one reason why I used an accountant this year, disorganization being probably the root cause.

I'll be looking at yet untried, tricky ways to save. $613 = 200 lattes, one year's auto insurance, one year's car fuel expenditure, one year's child's haircuts, one month's food budget. I could also look at increasing savings somehow, in an environment where interest rates are being cut.

One start: hubby received two tickets from our utility provider to the Green Festival happening this weekend, which we were planning to attend anyway. There's $30 saved right there. Lunch was free today: gourmet pizza. I even had a Coca-Cola, which tastes supremely sweet and syrupy, as opposed to supremely refreshing as it did when my boy and I sprinted eight blocks one night to catch a movie. $7.95 saved.

Eating from the pantry?
Freecycling as a sort of swap?
Once-a-month cooking? That'd save us $50...
Packing a lunch -- I'd save fourteen weeks' worth of lunches.

Link du Jour: Delinquencies map from the Wall Street Journal

... I owe $613 on last year's taxes, apparently.

Moving right along
Link du Jour: Extreme Savers Share Their Secrets

Some good stuff in here. Laura Rowley's Yahoo! column on financial index of happiness was good too, at least as a reminder of what I can do to keep my "hedonimeter" active: I consider her the wisest and most accessible of the Yahoo! Finance content providers.

I linked some of my accounts last night.
I just want to accumulate some cash right now: cutting back by 7% seems a worthy goal.

From WiseBread.com

I have procrastinated putting things on eBay. I don't know how to go about getting packing supplies cheaply, wonder if I have to go to Value Village or Freecycle for a scale, procrastinated funding a PayPal account.

I doubt many will take the majority of our books or CDs (alternative 1990s).

I hope an eBay seller will convince me that even an issue of WIRED magazine circa 1994, or a Zamfir LP would sell. Unlike the husband of the article author, I don't mind selling my WIREDs. The only book I managed to sell online was Sheilah Graham's The Garden of Allah and that was through Amazon.com's zSellers. Would half.com be better?

And how do I sell a big item, like a wedding dress, or a homemade booze cabinet? Is Craigslist my best bet?

How do I choose among Amazon.com, half.com and eBay to declutter my goods?
How would I streamline postage purchases, figure out what to charge (I suppose the scale would help)?

What would sell better at a garage sale? Mugs, glasses, spare kitchen items?