Baby Steps

I received an inexpensive fitness tracker as a gift for Christmas.  Once I turned it on and linked it to my phone, I proceeded to wear it and ignore it except to make sure it was charged enough. 



Today, I finally looked at the connected app and got an average of how many steps I’ve been taking on average.  5304.  Not bad for someone who spends up to 11 hours a day driving for work.  For now, my goal is to raise the amount by 5% a month with an initial increase of 10%.  Assuming some rounding (my app doesn’t let me set goals by single digits and I’m going to use it to keep track of my goal steps) and that everything goes according to plan, I’ll be close to 10,000 steps a day by the beginning of next year.  



I'm trying to make it fun, as well.  True, I could have just walked the perimeter of the truck stop, arms pumping, knocking these out as quickly as possible, but I'm trying to set a habit I will enjoy, not be miserable and suffer through it.  Today, I walked the curb for as much space as it was available.  I treated the steel poles protecting various things from being hit by vehicles as agility points, weaving back and forth between some of them, and I chose to slow down and enjoy the beauty of the rocks  outside of the fast food restaurant I walked past.


Since my clock is so closely monitored by the Department of Transportation and work, I’m going to have to squeeze these steps in.  I’m thinking if I can do 10% of them everytime I stop, well, that’s really not too bad.  Not bad is a goal, right? 

Is it ever okay to splurge when you are in debt?

It really depends on what you consider a splurge and what you mean by debt.  Oh, I know, you are looking for a clear answer and that really doesn't help, does it?  Well, let's explore!  

I really like coffee.  I adore it. I like to get a nice solid cup or mug, fill it with the black goodness, breathe in the aroma, pour my cream in carefully so it swirls while I watch it slowly disperse through the coffee, hold it in my hands, feeling the warmth through the cup and then sip the lovely beverage.  I don't occasionally indulge in coffee, it's a repeating part of my day.  A cup when I first wake up.  Another one late morning and another late afternoon.  At least. 

It's definitely a splurge, but, in this case, the splurge is both helpful since it keeps me alert and caffeine has been shown to have a laundry list of health benefits and it helps me to be in a better mood to deal with everything else that comes my way.  If I had a budget of $5 per day for food and drink, I'd still find a way to include coffee even it if it meant being hungry.  Since not going hungry counts as a necessity for most people, I feel comfortable deciding that coffee is worth it, particularly when I can make a cup on my truck for less than 30 cents. 

Taking my family to Busch Gardens is definitely a splurge.  Not only is it not remotely a necessity, but it's a huge amount of money for someone who might choose to skip a meal to be able to budget for coffee.  I budget in for these sort of splurges every once in a while.  Memories and experiences and I usually try to base when I'm doing them and how much I can spend based on progress on my debt (and eventually my savings).  This was worth it.  But it's not worth it to me to do this and go deeper into debt as a whole.  It's a one time thing for us.  There are other ways to make memories and, let's face it, other trips we'll go on in the future. 

What brought about this question is that I saw someone ask it about a pair of shoes.  She spent $200 on a pair of shoes at the end of a bad day.   The advice that was given was all about having a plan in place to deal with her debt and that splurges were okay if that was the case, just don't make a habit of them.  For me, this advice would have rung true if it wasn't about a $200 pair of shoes.  It boggled my mind, not just because of the cost, but because of the cost of purchasing them on credit.  Assuming you don't pay off your credit card every month and you carry debt, you could end up paying more than double what your purchase price is to pay it off!  

Let me repeat that.  

Assuming you don't pay off your credit card every month and you carry debt, you could end up paying more than double what your purchase price is to pay it off!  

So, that pair of shoes cost $400.  Plus tax, I'm assuming.  I could never see myself wanting to spend $400 on a pair of shoes unless I thought I could sell them for $1000.  But, to be fair, those are shoes and I just don't care about shoes as much as the next gal.  The main issue I have with this purchase is not just the splurge factor or that they are shoes.  What makes you happy isn't what makes me happy.  The issues is that it was done on impulse, and only afterwards did the person consider the impact of the decision.  

I make some impulsive decisions.  They are usually along the lines of helping people though, going for a walk suddenly or reaching out to a friend I haven't talked to in awhile.   When I thought about going to Busch Gardens with my family, it started with a coupon.  I thought, "Hey!  I wonder how much it would cost to do this thing!"  So, I started doing some research.  I made sure my children and my grandson would be available on a date we could all go together.  I found out my grandson could get in for free for the summer and sent my daughter the information on how to do that.  I opted to spend an additional $10 each on their tickets so they could have summer passes and go again since they live in the area.  I found a coupon that reduced my ticket by $25.  I planned out food, gas, transportation.  

Because it was a trip, it did take more planning, but I would have done that if I was the kind of person to buy those shoes.  In fact, I did buy shoes recently for work.  My old pair was wearing out and I started trying on shoes at various stores.  The ones I settled on were men's shoes, and cost $85 at the first 5 stores I saw them at.  I did some research online, found out I could order them at another store and save $20, IF I ordered them in store or bought them in store.  I was able to get into a store, purchase the shoes to be delivered to my house (they didn't have my size in stock) and they arrived before the next time I was home.  My previous pair of work shoes were the same brand and lasted almost 3 years being worn about 95% of the time I was working.  I feel good about this purchase.  

It works towards me being able to continue to better my finances.  It would be worth it at twice the price.   

Is it ever okay to splurge when you are in debt? 

Would it be worth it at twice the price?

I'm a truck driver, what's your super power?

I also plug USB cables in correctly on the first try and I've been known to read upside down faster than most people can read upright. 

Just don't ask me to fold a fitted sheet. 

We all have strengths and weaknesses.  It's great if you can find a way to have an income doing what you enjoy that plays to your strengths, but it's not great if you are never challenged to learn new skills or to become stronger. 

The question is, what do you do about your weaknesses and the things you don't care to spend time doing?  I mean, who likes paying the bills? 

Oh, wait, that's me, too!  I love paying the bills.  I keep careful track of what I owe where and how much money I have in different accounts and will look back at where those accounts were 1 month, 6 months and a year ago to assess my progress.  But, that wasn't my point. 

So, you don't like keeping track of your money or you don't like paying the bills.  But, you do it anyway.  Or, maybe your spouse/partner does it.  Or did you crunch the numbers enough to figure out that you could hire someone to do it?   However your bills get paid, you pay them.  Because, if you didn't, the rest of your life would crumble and you wouldn't have all the parts of it that you do enjoy. 

Maybe the thing you don't like doing is something you can get someone else to take care, maybe it's something you decided isn't important or maybe it's something that you just keep plugging away at, hoping to improve. 

For the record, I usually start folding the fitted sheet and then try to force whatever I've ended up with into a vaguely rectangular flattish shape.   That's okay.  My life isn't more valuable or less based on whether my fitted sheets look nice in the cupboard.  But what if we're talking about a skill that has an impact on something that matters? 

I'm not saying, "Be a truck driver even if you hate driving." Or an accountant who hates numbers or a professional athlete even though you trip over your own feet when walking.

But how likely is it that something truly profitable has no difficult parts to it?  Perhaps a challenge or something that just isn't that enjoyable.  I like driving.  I really don't like doing double drop and hooks, I  feel actual physical pain due to previous injuries, but it's worth doing those occasionally to be earning good money doing something that I enjoy most of the time.  I take it as a personal challenge to keep trying to find a new way of moving my body in the hopes that I will get better at it. 

Figure out what your super powers are.  Figure out if there is a way they can help you towards your goals.  Don't let the things you don't enjoy doing keep you from doing the things you do enjoy doing. 

My stock "crashed" and why that's a good thing

First, a confession.  I am in debt and have been for some time.  About half of my debt was student loans and the other half was credit card debt.  Now, the ratio is down to about 2/3 student loans and 1/3 credit card debt. 

This is not okay.  In fact, thanks to another blogger (I will find the link and put it here!), I found the words to explain how not okay this is.  Owing money on credit cards is an emergency.  I've been in this emergency for going on 12 years.  

On the flip side, I think I have a pretty good excuse for most of it.  I needed to stay alive.  Not day to day living expenses so much as that I needed a shot )to stop bleeding to death so I could have the surgery to make the bleeding stop forever) and my copay (when I had insurance) was $2700.  I was able to finance that with loans from family and the ever present credit card debt.  I had paid down 1/3 of my maximum credit card debt when that came up.  I pay off $2000 and then get hit with something that has to be taken care of or I will literally fall apart for $1500 or worse, $3000.  

It's been like that for awhile and it's depressing.  I'll putter away at my student loan debt for years, I have decent interest rates and they are in no danger of growing, but I desperately want to pay off my credit cards.  

I'd been thinking about cashing in my stocks for some time to pay it all off, but there always seemed to be something more pressing.  With only 2-3 days home a month, there's so much to do.  But when I saw my stocks were enough that I could actually pay off all of my credit card debt, I started kicking myself for not doing it sooner.  I started rummaging for how do I actually sell these, and when I was on the road with some time off (14 hour days take their toll, the toll primarily being collapse into bed unconscious when I'm done before getting up and doing it again!) I readied myself to sell them only to find that they had gone from being worth a few hundred dollars more than I owed to credit cards to being a couple thousand less.  

The companies that I have shares in are still worth the same amount (or more) that they were a month ago, and this is why this is a good thing.  While I really shouldn't be investing in the stock market or much of anywhere other than my 401k up to the matching point while I have credit card debt, I do have an automatic deduction set up to purchase certain funds and stocks and I don't intend to change it.  Particularly now that the market has crashed.  

For purely psychological purposes, I'm going to leave it again.  I'm going to let investors get over their sudden fears, while I keep plugging away and when my stocks have recovered, then I will sell them and pay off my bills.  The only reason they are still down at the moment is fear.  Fear of what the Fed will do with interest rates, fear than the company they were hoping would make 5 million in profit this past quarter only made 4.75 million and it could be a sign they were wrong about other things, but it all boils down to fear that the stock will keep plummeting and they will lose out.

Well, it might.  We could also have an extinction level event with almost no warning and you could die in the next few seconds while sitting here reading this. 

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Still here?  Good.  So am I.  So is the market and it will be in a week and in a month.  

I love to check my stocks.  When the market is rising, it's beautiful for my bottom line.  When it's falling, it's a great time to work on your investments before it rises again.  We all know the mantra to buy low and sell high, but enough people are making emotional buying and selling decisions that the market fluctuates because of that alone.  

I'm almost out of this emergency situation.  First, I beat cancer.  Now, I'm beating this.  12 years in the making, but victory is at hand!

I'm about to eat the best black berry pie ever!

Life is good no matter how bad it is. There always seems to be a little remnant of sunshine somewhere and I just recently found a great big ray of it.

My company truck has been in the shop since Saturday morning.  At first, I was able to sleep in it at night, which as an over the road truck driver, means I was sleeping in my own bed.  Each day, the mechanics would tell me they needed to look at this one more thing and they would be doing it later that day.  Each day, they found something new and it would be ready the next day.  Now, it's in a new shop 30 miles away from the hotel and I'm starting to run low on important things, like healthy food and underwear. 

The hotel is nice.  The one I was supposed to stay in had flooded and had lost 14 rooms, so I was forced to go to the fancier hotel next door.  The company will be reimbursing me, so I'm not worried about the cost of the hotel, but I'm super antsy and I want to get back to work!  So, I have been trying to make the best use of my time.  I've gotten a few projects done, I've worked out and I've started this blog! 

I took a walk and found blackberries.  I snagged a cookie and some almonds from the hotel lobby and I already had some butter.  Oven?  Microwave.  I'm not sure this even qualifies as pie, but it's delicious and I love that I made it with stuff I already had or found and that it's relatively healthy compared to other sweet tooth options.

So, what is this about?  It's about being financially, mentally,  and physically healthy in a mobile world.  My world is a little more mobile than most and comes with it's own special challenges.  Er, um, I mean, opportunities for growth!  Yay! 

The pseudopie is done.  It's messy and delicious.