Well Thursday I got my first ever direct deposited paycheck. It was pretty easy and painless but for me I would rather still get a paper paycheck and take it to the bank. Maybe I'm old fashioned.


I deducted my regular budgeted amount and took out my spending money. My spending money was $120 but varies each paycheck a little. I use that money for eating out, any fun activities (like movies, etc) and groceries. So $120 doesn't really go too far for 2 weeks.

I put the usual $50 towards the extra Principal of my Mortgage. I'm sticking to my plan on that but wish I could do a little better.

Put $40 to my 2010 IRA.

Put $60 towards payback for the car repair from July. I now owe myself $100 for that.

Put $18 for the step ladder I wanted to buy. I used my credit card but that 18 bucks is in the bank waiting to pay it off.

That left me with $17 extra money that just stays in my checking as a cushion.

Next paycheck is what I consider an extra check cause I get 3 instead of 2 in October. Yay! I budget my extra check a little differently but nothing drastic.
It will be nice being able to use some of it towards my travel fund.

Thursday was payday and at least i'm writing it down on here sooner than I usually do.
After my regular budgeted amounts I put $50 towards extra Principal on my mortgage. I put $72 towards paying myself back for the last car I had done. I now still owe myself $160 for that.
Putting $10 towards 2010 IRA. And that leaves $11 extra thats just going to be cushion in my checking account.

I decided that starting next payday that I need to allow myself a little extra cash for some things that are not absolutely necessary but that i do need.
I tweeked my next budget already to free up about 20 bucks or so. The first thing I'm going to get with that extra is a small step ladder for about 18 bucks. Once I get caught up on these odd things I need then I'll put that extra back into the normal budget.

Another thing about my next payday that i'm not really happy about is that Wal Mart will not give me an actual paycheck anymore. I like getting a normal old fasioned paycheck with a paystub so I can do my finances the way I want to. But now we have to either have Direct deposit or a debit card. They wont even give a paystub anymore so you can keep track of hours and such. That I have to print from the internet. Ohhh well it will work out and I know many people love the direct deposit thing. I just really get P.o.ed
that they are making it so hard to keep track of my info. Plus they only told us about it this week and it starts on our next check. I signed up for the direct deposit yesterday.

On a completely unrelated note, I'm planning on going camping this monday night. Its only one night but i'm looking forward to it. Have a great holiday weekend everyone.

Got a letter from Chase that they raised my credit limit from $7000 to 10,000.

They really want me to spend some money.
It really doesn't matter cause I always charge basically the same things and pay them off when I get the bill.

Sorry to anyone that may read this for being so slow updating. I always say that I'm a bit of a slacker. And my payday updates are basically to help me keep track of things. It really does help.

Last Friday was my payday. After deducting my spending money and my regular budget it left me with my usual $50 extra towards Mortgage Principal.

Put $50 towards my E-Fund.

Had only $38 to put towards paying myself back for the latest car repair. I now still owe myself $232.

I had somewhat good news. My mortgage escrow or something went down leaving me with a lower Mortgage payment. I'll probably pay about the same as I have been and put the extra towards the Principal. Makes it a little easier getting it paid off.

I bought a Mega Millions (Lottery) ticket the other day and of course it starts one to dreaming. I realize that the odds of winning a lottery are pretty bad. But I don't see anything wrong with playing once in a while responsibly. And eventually someone does win.
So FOREVER I've had a basic plan in my head of how I would deal with a huge windfall such as winning the Mega Millions. For the most part my plan is pretty dull and has not changed much over the years. Its actually gotton more conservative as I've gotton older and strive more for the simple life.
My "plan" is mostly how I would save and invest most of the money. I would do some repairs on my modest home but don't see the need for a new one. Right at the moment I would not buy a new car. But it sure would be nice having the money available to go buy one anytime that I did need to. The 2 big things for me are that I would definately quit my job soon, and I would definately travel a lot more.
As things are right now I wouldn't even be in a big hurry to quit my job. It would have to happen, but no big rush. Since I work in a store selling toys I think I'd happilly stay there through Christmas. I mean i'd have the rest of my life after that to never have to work on a holiday again. I'd also book the terribly expensive trip that I drool over to Antarctica. I know most of you would choose other places, but I'd get to those too. But I really would not spend all that much money on material objects. I've had enough of those in my life.
A friend of mine constantly comments that he wants to win the lottery but that he would only be happy if it were something like 100 million dollars. He talks about all the silly things he would blow his money on. I think if he really won 100 mil, it would be gone within a year or so. He even insists that if he won such a prize that he would have my house torn down and re-built for me. I don't want that even if someone else is paying.

I would love to win a huge amount of money. But all I really want is to be able to pay my bills, live in a comfortable enough way, and be able to travel more. I can do a lot of that on my own without winning a lottery. Its just winning would make it a whole lot easier of course. Just wanted to share some of my thoughts on the subject and wondering what any of you would do if you won a large sum of money? And what amount of money would really make you happy?

Gee it seems like paydays are coming up fast lately. Thats really a pretty good thing but it seems like life is passing by too fast sometimes.

Got paid last Friday. Put my usual $50 for extra Principal on my mortgage. I've been very good about that. Put a measly $9 into my E-Fund. Put $110 into my checking cushion but using it to pay myself back for the recent $380 car repair I had. So that leaves me still owing myself another $270.
The rest of my check went into my ordinary budget.

In my last post my cars warning lights were on and I had to take it in to fix whatever the problem was. I had hoped it was a free or low cost fix because the last time something similar happened it was just caused by a loose gas cap.

Well it turned out to be the alternater. The repair cost seems ridiculous but at least its fixed. The repair along with an oil change was $380. Ouch.
Good news is my little car is running good and hopefully will last me at least another 8 years.

Got paid this past Friday. It seems like it came quick this time since I posted my update like a week late last time.

Put my usual $50 extra into my Mortgage Principal, and put $10 into E-Fund. After
all my normal expenses were budgeted for
I had $110 left over for cushion in my checking. I've finally built my checking
account back up pretty well to what I like it to be. But unfortunately Friday
night a warning light came on in my car. It seems to be working ok but now I have to find out whats wrong. I think from past experience that the gas cap wasn't tight enough and it set the warning light off. That happened once before and the dealer fixed it for free. So I got my fingers crossed that it will be free or cheap to fix. When I get the car to the dealer I think I'll get an oil change too since its overdo. It seems like there is always something out to get my money.

On another note I usually use yahoo for my email. The other day I got an email that almost fooled me. It said it was from Yahoo and it said that because of tough financial times that if I didn't click on the link and update my account that my account would be closed in 2 weeks. Fortunately I realized that it was a scam and I forwarded the email to the real Yahoo. It sounded pretty convincing though so I hope no one got ripped off.

Lots of excuses but got paid this past Thursday and am just now updating it on here. I should make a blog about my excuses for not posting on my blog. "Honest, the dog ate my blog. LOL.

Anyways. Put $50 as usual towards the Principal on my mortgage. Put $20 towards 2010 IRA. And after everything else was taken care of I had $70 left as cushion in my checking account. The reason I'm padding my checking is cause I had spent
more than usual for awhile and depleted much of what I had in that account. Also I still need some very expensive dental work in the near future and I'm trying to
save up for it.

Did something thrifty tonight when I got home from work. I cut my own hair. I've actually never been to a barber in my entire life. My mother when she was alive used to cut it. When she got too ill I just decided to cut it myself. It may not
look great but its not too bad. Besides I'm not all that pretty or anything to worry about it.

I found a dollar bill last week. During the past week or so I also saw quite a bit of change (mostly pennies) but for various reasons I didn't pick it all up.
Not sure how much of that I actually did pick up though.

Got my paycheck on Thursday night. Its been a little better lately than whats it was for a long time. It just depends on how much they cut my hours from week to week.

I haven't been able to save much of anything lately. Been focusing on keeping my head above water and all the basic stuff. After allowing for all my bills, and taking out my needed spending money, I was able to put $50 towards the extra Principal of my mortgage (thats become a habit now), put $10 toward my 2010 IRA, $10 to E-fund, and $10 to Travel Fund. That left me with $90 extra that I just left in checking to continue replenishing my cusion in there.

I also had a check for $10 from MySurvey that I deposited to go into my travel Fund.

Good news for the 4th of July work schedule is that I have fairly close to my regular hours plus I'll get holiday pay so that means I'll have a pretty good check coming up.

I'm surviving OK without TV. I haven't had cable in a long while and just didn't want to get the digital tv box, so now I can't watch TV at all. I really don't mind too much. I did notice though that I'm spending more time online. I still watch a good bit of DVD or VHS movies. I have my own collection plus I get them from the Library.

Decided to get a service plan added to my gas bill that covers any inside repairs to my gas or electric lines. I normally
have always felt these kinds of plans were a waste of money and refused to buy
into them. But weighing the pros and cons I think that right now its a good investment. The plan is going to be $4.95 a month. That doesn't seem too outrageous. And my home is an older home
that who knows when something will break.
But the main reason I signed up was cause the city is going to completely
re-do my street. They are paying for it entirely from some kind of grant. But I was thinking that if they mess up and make some kind of mistake it could damage something inside my home that they might not want to fix. So this will help give me some peace of mind JUST IN CASE.
Hopefully I made a smart decision. Even if I didn't I don't think the cost will kill me, and I can cancel it anytime with 30 day notice.

Did anyone else have problems with this website the last couple of days? It set my virus scanner off with a trojan virus. Then the next day there were no blogs to read. I was surprised when I got on today and it looks like nothing had happened.

Anyways, today is payday. Its a real good one for a change. I need it.
Because I had been on vacation I'll actually get paid a full 40 hours per week instead of the 36 or 38 hours I've been working lately. Now if only I could figure out how to take vacation permanently.
I'll also get an extra day of pay because Of memorial day. And we got a bonus of
$206.
I'm taking out my usual spending money and putting $50 towards the extra Principal of my house payment. The rest is all going into my checking. It will help build up the cusion plus I have dental work coming in the near future that is kind of expensive.

Last entry for the vacation pictures of Costa Rica. I'm glad some of you enjoyed seeing them and I enjoyed showing them.

This is just a view of the forest from the canopy tour.




There were lots of leaf cutter ants and the sign points them out cause they bite.


Here is the hotel I stayed at. Its not a fancy hotel but it was very comfortable, had internet access and cable TV and was very reasonably priced.


Here's just a typical view of a street in San Jose. You can see what the official taxis look like, and the misty mountains in the background.


This is a nice view out in the countryside. There were lots of farms and plantations. You can tell just by looking at it how fertile the soil must be.


Last but not least. This was one of my favorites. Very poisonous but cute. These were the frogs from the movie Apocalypco that they made poison darts out of.

Hope I didn't bore anyone with the pictures. I took an aweful lot(Over 600). Just sharing some random ones that might be of interest to some of you.

Nothing new financially except going back to work today. Thats tough after over 2 weeks off.



Don't know what this bird was but I thought he was cute.


This is the National Theatre. Inside it has a beautiful italian design


This one gives you a general idea of inside the National Theatre.


One of the Canopy Zip Lines.

Here are some more Costa Rica pictures.
Thanks to everyone who took a look yesterday and for the comments.





Howler Monkey.



Oxcarts were what they first used to transport coffee so they are a very important symbol in Costa Rica.


This water slide was at the vulcanic hot springs. I thought it was shallow so I almost drowned when I flew out of there into 9 feet deep water. I was fine but a girl had to pull me to shallower water.


A picture of Arenal Vulcano from the hot springs.




The gardens at the hot springs.

Here are a few pictures from my vacation in Costa Rica.
These first pics were from a boat ride
on a river there. I think its called Sarapiqua river.
The third pic is of the "Jesus Christ" lizard that can run across the water. Unfortunately I didn't see them do that.
I'll post some more pics over the next couple of days if no one minds.

I've been on vacation for almost 2 weeks now. It has gone by fast but it also feels like I've been off forever. I haven't had a chance to read very many blogs.

Did my camping trip which went pretty well. The highlight was an 18 mile canoe trip on the mohican river. Then went on my trip to Costa Rica (FINALLY).
Costa Rica is beautiful for the most part. There are a lot of poor sections with trash and stuff laying around. And its difficult for those of us that can't speak Spanish. But overall its a great place to visit. It kind of grows on you the longer you are there too.
I'm going to try to put up a couple of my pictures on here. The canopy zip lines were one of my favorite things. I stayed in San Jose and just took day trips to the various activities I wanted to do. If I get to return there I would spend part of the time in Monteverde which is more out the in countryside.

On my payday update I just got my check from last week yesterday. I deposited the entire thing. I pretty much am using the entire check for my usual expenses and
replacing the cusion in my checking account. My cusion has taken a huge beating as of late and it will take me awhile to get back on track. But I'm not in any debt or anything so thats a good thing. I will also use $50 as usual from that check to go into paying extra on my mortgage. So I'm doing ok. Just have to
slow down now on the spending, be a little more frugal, and start working a little harder on my goals.
It will take me a couple of months to get in what I consider good financial shape.

I did some MySurvey surveys today and redeemed points for $10. I'll put that into my vacation fund. I've got several places I want to go.
Vacation planning is kind of a side goal and hobby for me.

In my last post I commented that I had saved for a pair of binoculars but decided not to get them because of other expenses and so forth.
Well I caught myself off guard at break today and saw an ad from a different store for one of the binoculars I was interested in. Their price was originally $149 but were on sale for $79.78.
My stores price was about $106. I couldn't resist so I had them price match the binoculars for me at the other stores price. I haven't got to try them out good yet but I think i'll be happy with them.
They are Nikon Action 10x50.
Its probably something I shouldn't have bought but I could afford it and I had planned on buying them originally anyways. Plus I think the price was a great deal.

I've been spending quite a bit more money lately than usual. But I squeeze it into the budget and either pay cash or pay the credit card off every month so that I don't have any finance charges. Most of the things I've bought have been more necessary than just a want. I saved up money for Binoculars but decided not to get any for the time being. I also plan to eventually get a small camcorder but that can wait.
My big expense last week was roof repair.
I mentuoned that my roof has been giving me problems for years and no one seemed to be able to fix it. I finally just had the problem area of my roof completely re-done and as far as I can tell it has solved the problems. I can't really say for absolutely certain though but it seems to have worked and its not leaking with all this rain we've been getting. Anyway that cost a little over $1800. It could have been worse. I could have saved money I believe in the first place if only I had it originally done by a professional roofer instead of a friend of a friend. Never will do that again.
I'm just very pleased with the new roof and hoping.

Out of this new paycheck I have to take out a bit more spending money than usual but I still have all the normal expenses covered.
I also will be putting my usual extra $50 towards the Principal of my mortgage. After all that I'll have $60 from my paycheck that is kinda extra. It will pretty much go into my checking to add to the cusion thats taking big hits lately.

I did accomplish another one of my goals last Monday. I had my first ever yard sale. It was a failure but at least I did it. I really only have 2 more of my goals to do. The E-Fund and the 2010 IRA. Everthing else is either done or on autopilot. I'm working on everything but its coming along very slow.

On a more personal level I've been very sad about some relationship issues lately. I don't know whats wrong with me but dating and such things just don't work for me. I can't talk about whats wrong specifially but to make it as simple as possible to explain lets just say that a woman I care deeply about dumped me. Its a little more complicated than that. Even worse is that it was set off by comments some jerk made where we work. The comments upset her and she took it out on me. Maybe we'll make up but I don't really see it happening.
I'm getting too old to be playing dating games anymore. I never did good with it and can't see myself going through all this again. It takes too big of a toll out of me. Single, alone, and lonely is still better than dealing with relationships I suppose.
Sorry for rambling and thanks to anyone who bothered reading all this. Have a great weekend.

Today was payday and fairly uneventful. But I did order some Costa Rican money for my vacation. I like to have some on hand when I arrive instead of rushing when i get there. For about 200 US dollars I'll get roughly 90,000 in Costa Rican money. I feel kinda rich.
The bank has to order it so its supposed to arrive on monday. Plenty of time.

I also put $50 from my check towards my mortgage principal as planned.

I have way more things going on right now than I really like. But some are good things and some aren't too bad. My roof has been having numerous issues for years. I picked a roofer that seems to be good and they are supposed to repair my roof before I go on vacation. Hopefully that goes smoothly and no more roof issues. Its going to cost a little over $1800. Still expensive as far as i'm concerned but not as bad as I thought. They are basically going to install a special vent on the very top of my roof and re-shingle the front half of my house.

In july my city is supposed to completely tear apart and replace my street and including part of my driveway. The good news is that there are no charges to me. They have some kind of bond or such thats paying for it. I'm sure the street will look great when its done. But i'm sure not looking forward to the hassle of the construction. Most of my city is already tore up with things being repaired. Anyways thats another reason I want the roof finished soon so I don't have to worry about that at the same time as my street is being worked on.

Went to a local travel expo today sponsored by a new travel agency. It was sort of a small event but they had all the
various tour groups represented and I enjoyed it. They had free shrimp but I don't eat seafood. I did have some cheese and crackers. I also got some free canvas bags, chip clips and stuff like that. I still had to work today but didn't start till 5 pm. so that worked out too.

Got my paycheck today.
From this check I'm putting $50 towards my extra mortgage principal, $40 towards the new Binoculars I want, and approxamately $20 towards a small new suitcase I'm getting for vacation. I need quite a few things (mostly small stuff) for my vacation so I'm squeezing them into the budget slowly. I have till the end of May to get everything I want/need.

Its funny I have about 5 weeks till vacation and I already rather suddenly decided where I want to go next year. My vacation plans are always subject to change but I usually know when I fall onto something that I just have to do.
First I saw a travel show about it last night then I saw a very nice tour to the place at my travel expo today. I think I'm going to Machu Picchu and the Galapagos Islands in 2010.
Like I said there are lots of variables that can change my mind. Especially price! It looks like a 14 day trip will cost over $6000. But once I get a place in my mind and I get a certain feeling about it means I'll probably be going.

Thanks again everyone for all the kind words about the loss of my cat Penny.
I'm doing ok about it and I think she is better off. I still worry about her and all the people and animals I have lost over the years if they are OK wherever they may be.

My cat Penny died last night. She's been sick for quite awhile so I knew it was coming and probably for the best. But I'll miss her.

Got my paycheck thursday night. This paycheck is what I consider my extra paycheck. I get 3 this month instead of 2.
Out of this check I will put $100 towards my E-Fund.
$100 towards my travel fund. $200 towards 2010 IRA. I'm going to leave $100 in my checking thats basically just extra cusion but in reality it will go towards a new front door I want to buy for my house. And I designated $40 towards a pair of binoculars I want. Not sure if I'll get them or not. They will cost me a total of about $170 if I do get them. I've been wanting a good pair of binoculars for years but couldn't justify buying them. But since they would be wonderful on my vacation this year I am re-considering it.

Yesterday I spent a long time and energy booking my long awaited vacation for this year. I ended up going at least full circle of my original plans. I originally planned on a a tour of Costa Rica for a week to 14 days last year. Then things didn't go as planned so I thought maybe a short cruise. The cruises weren't exactly what I wanted so I looked into just a short stay in Aruba. Then thought about it and decided I could do the same thing in Costa Rica which is where I wanted to go in the first place. LOL.
So I booked a flight and hotel to San Jose, Costa Rica for 5 nights starting the end of May. I can book the little excursions that I want to take right from the hotel. Some of the main things I want to do is a canopy tour and a trip to Arenal vulcano. I'll also explore San Jose and its museums. There seems to be endless amounts of things to see there but this will satisfy my travel bug and give me a taste of the country to maybe go back again another time.

I received a phishing scam email yesterday for a credit card that I no longer have. I called the credit card up to report it and they asked me to forward the email to them.

Today I picked up my tax papers finally from HR Block. All I have to do now is send in the city taxes. The rest is being e-filed. I think I did pretty good. I will get $1484 back from Federal and $134
back from Ohio. Pretty much pays for vacation more or less.

I did some exploring with a friend of mine today. We went to a covered bridge and a cemetary thats supposed to be haunted. It wasn't scary but it was a nice day outside. We also stopped at another "haunted" cemetary. It wasn't scary at all but it was historically interesting. There were quite a few civil war veterans burried there and one tombstone that said "Hero of Bunker Hill" from a Revolutionary War veteran.
Otherwise I was more interested in some near by cows. I tried to trick them to come to me by pretending I had an apple. They edged closer and closer but wouldn't fall for it.
All in all it was a pretty good day.

Didn't get to start work till 5 pm. today, so ran some errands on my way.
Got a new pair of Nike shoes that I needed desperately. They feel sooooo good.

Then I picked up my paycheck that I should have got on Thursday but forgot.
There is a bank right next to my store so I just walked over to do my banking.
They had a bunch of leftover chicken at work from yesterday so I got free food again today.

From this check I paid myself back the last $40 that I owed myself from the car repairs I had done in December. So thats one more completed goal.

I also put $40 extra towards this months mortage principal, and another $10 towards my 2010 IRA. On my next payday I'll be able to put a bit towards my emergency fund. Ohhh right now I have about $1900 in my E-Fund. This year I'll add at least my $400 goal to it plus whatever interest that account earns. Next year I'll try to put a bit more into it than I can do this year.

Thats all I got as far as updates are concerned. I'm still researching for a vacation this summer. For some reason I'm having a difficult time planning things out. I have been considering a cruise but it looks like I will be travelling alone and they charge for 2 people regardless. To me that seems insane. Now I'm considering Aruba. I saw a deal that was about $1077 for airfare and 5 nights in a hotel there. It seemed really nice and I almost just booked it right then and there.
But then I thought I should research how safe Aruba is and also get a better idea of what entertaining myself there would cost. Does anyone have any opinion about if Aruba would be worth seeing? Or if anyone has a good suggestion of someplace else that might be better for a 4 or 5 day trip? Any ideas are welcome and appreciated.

Today was a very odd day. In some regards it was one of the better days I've had in awhile. But some strange (scary, not so good) things were going on too.
It was payday but silly me forgot to get my check. So I'll post my payday update ater I get the check.

One of the good things to start out today was that I seemed to be getting pretty nice customers. That doesn't happen as often as you might think. When they are nice its easier to help them and be extra nice to them in return. Good for everyone. After I helped one woman she was very happy and a new manager either heard the conversation or she told him. Anyway he came over and thanked me for the good customer service.

We also got a free chicken dinner at work today (chicken, cole slaw, beans, buns,cake.) that was all quite good.

The bad (scary) thing that happened was that several people got the text messages that you probably heard about in the news.
The messages basically said that gangs were going to kill women in Wal Mart stores. At first I believe our store kind of tried to keep it quiet but the story spread like wildfire. We lost some customers because they decided not to risk shopping today. A few of us talked with management and talked them into contacting our local police just in case. I'm somewhat surprised that police were not patroling or checking up on us. Even if it was a hoax I think they need to be prepared for a worse case scenerio.
As a safety precaustion our store wouldn't let workers go outside without at least one other person. I had to work outside for awhile to help women to their cars and keep an eye out. Fortunately it supposedly is a nationwide hoax and I think they may have even caught the person that started it. They do deserve to be hung from the highest tree in my opinion. I'm tired of thugs.

There was a similar problem a few days ago. A strange guy was following customers to the front door then walking quickly back to his car. When some of our people went outside to check he jumped into his car and sped off. Then last night a strange man dressed in puple was outside sniffing trees and weird stuff like that. Its not like I live in a huge city where those things are more commonplace. But it doesn't matter anymore. People are getting meaner and crazier everywhere. I really think society has to toughen up on these people or no one will be able to leave their homes. And I'm not a gun advocate either. I think all these people stalking up on guns and ammo are just as crazy. Our store can't even keep up with the supply of bullets anymore. Some guys are buying thousands of dollars worth of ammo. And they openly talk about how when the race war or whatever they think is going to happen comes down that they intend to start killing anyone that gets in their way. Scary times. I think a lot will just eventually blow over but hopefully it doesn't get too much worse first.

Payday was last Thursday but didn't get a chance to make a post until now.
I paid another $50 towards my Dec. car repairs. Now I only owe myself $40 and will be done with that on my next payday.

I put $60 towards the extra Mortgage Principal my next house payment. I also designated $10 to add to my 2010 IRA.

I have a bunch of plans for things I want to do this summer. Some are for fun and some are things that need to be done for my house, etc. I don't know if I can get it all done. I seem to run out of time and money is always tight. Like I said in another post I'm basically just taking things one at a time as they come along.
And I'm trying to prioritize the most important things.

Some of the fun things I want to over the next few months


- Already got a Personal day on a Saturday in March to go to the Cleveland Sportsman's show. I'm not really a big fan of the show but I like to go sometimes. I don't like the fishing stuff and guns but there are travel related things I love, animals, gadgets,
and plenty of things that are worth seeing.

- Camping. I plan on camping at least 3 times and going canoeing once. I've already got a weekend off in May set aside for camping. I'm a bit of a freeze baby so you wont see out much before that.
- Walking and hiking. I love walking but have been slack lately and need to walk a lot more. Its good for my physical and mental health.

- Taking a foreign vacation. I keep planning on going to Costa Rica but some things keep getting in the way. So I changed gears a bit and might go on a short Caribbean cruise instead. Regardless of the final destination I'm going SOMEWHERE foreign this summer.

- I'd like to start Fencing again. I fenced for about 2 years and loved it but now I'd have to start all over from scratch. Don't get me wrong I'm not a professional or anything. It was just great excercise and a lot of fun.

-Going to "investigate" a few more supposedly haunted places here in Ohio.
I never see anything but its fun, scary, and interesting to go to these places.

- Take a mostly relaxing (maybe a little scary) week off for Halloween. I pretty much do this every year. I just like Halloween.

Ok there are probably a few more things but thats all I can think of for now. Hopefully I can do all these things and still get the more important less fun things done too.

Well I rambled on enough for now. Everyone have a great day.

Splurged on my day off and bought the new razor I needed. So far it seems pretty good. I really didn't want to spend the money on it. Saved almost 8 dollars cause of my employee discount. I'm also supposed to be getting a manufacturers rebate but they haven't sent me the rebate form yet.

Nothing much else to write about. Since I've been blogging a little more about my goals in general it has helped me stay more focused on them. My next little "mini-goal" is to get my taxes done. I'm going to try to at least take them in to the tax preparer before the end of the month. The month is almost gone so I'm pushing that a bit. I mainly just have to get off my butt and gather all my paperwork.

Everyone have a great day

Doing pretty well with my goals i think, although in a way I'm cheating a bit. Basically I pad my checking account way more than I really should. In some ways thats a bad thing but it gives me peace of mind in that I never have any fees or
or shortages. I also do receive a small amount of interest on my checking. Anyways, I was way too
padded in my checking so I sat down and calculated my expenses and decided that
I could easily tranfer $1700 from my checking into my saving for my IRA.
So that put me over the 4000 i was saving for this years IRA. So thats a goal completed! YAY ME! Even if I did cheat a little.

With my current paycheck I'm paying myself back $54 more dollars for the car repairs in december. Now I only owe myself $90. I'm putting $40 towards my extra mortgage for Feb. and putting $10 towards my 2010 IRA goal. So I think its coming along very nicely. Everything I've listed is either on track or ahead of the plan.

I need to buy a few things. They really are needs not wants. I need a new razor, a few work cloths, and a new pair of shoes. I pretty much already have the money for these things. I try to save up for these kinds of things separately though. I also need to do some home repairs this spring or summer that could be difficult to save up for.
First things first though. I'll buy the razor sometime in the next couple of days. My old razors are either dead or shave like a club. Its time for a new one.

I got a message on my answering machine when I got home tonight that the bank want me to call them. I don't think its anything bad but that sort of call is always a little scary. I'll make a post tommorrow to let anyone that may care know what they want.

Found another dime yesterday. I seem to only find dimes or pennies lately. I think its mainly cause of the size people have a hard time holding on to them. If only I could design a new U.S. $20 bill thats hard to hold on to. LOL.
I supppose people already have enough of a hard time holding on to their money as it is.

I just got my electric bill. It went up the past 2 months a tiny bit but I'm not complaining. I don't know of anyone that has a lower electric bill than mself. It was for $20.15. So I can't really complain at all.

I attended an AAA virtual travel expo last night. It was interesting but not much use for me. They didn't put enough information to suit me. Basically you have to contact a real travel agent with anything you are interested in so that
they can sell you a vacation. I don't like that cause I want the info. put in front of me so I can decide for myself what I want. I notice thats pretty common little trick though. They think if they let you make your own decisions that you might choose someone else. That trick doesn't work well on me. I remember once having a similar situation at a car dealer. I walked out and bought a car from someone else. If the first guy would have answered my questions the way I asked him to I would have purchased the car from him. Anyways, otherwise the travel show was interesting and has a lot of potential. I was impressed how it was set up to feel like you were in a real live place seeing a real live travel expo.

Well thats all I can think of for now. I have just been trying to keep up a little bit better with my blog. I have to go to work in about 20 minutes. Looking forward to being off friday and saturday. I'm not doing anthing all that special
but it will still be nice having weekend days off for a change.