Put away your purse & become debt-averse

foxgloves

Hello Friday readers,
Well, I decided it was probably time for another 'debtisode'. Since the LBM struck few years ago, I have often found myself thinking of how irresponsible I used to be with my money, & feeling a bit surprised now, why nothing sparked me to have that LBM realisation a hell of a lot earlier. There was one occasion I remember all too well at the height of my spendy decades. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll share the sorry tale.........if you have zero interest in sorry tales from ex-silly spenders, then do feel free to exit stage left.
Back in the Spendy Years, I used to love popping down to London on the train to meet my sister for a Saturday shopping trip. We'd hit Oxford Street, starting with coffee & cakes in Selfridges & pretty much keep going until time for me to get the train home. But on this particular occasion? Hmmmm.
As I didn't do any financial planning, I hadn't been to the cashpoint the day before, so realised as soon as I got up that I hadn't got enough cash to pay the taxi I'd booked to take me to the station. I jumped in my car & drove to the bank, popped my card in the cashpoint & requested £100 (got to take some cash spends with me too, of course). Cashpoint said 'Insufficient funds'. I re-entered £50. Cashpoint said 'You're having a laugh'. Entered £20. Nope!! Rather desperately, entered £10 (which would cover my taxi fare). "INSUFFICIENT FUNDS" repeated the cashpoint as it swallowed my card. It's so early in the morning, the bank is closed & I'm unable to go in & demand it back. Do I even remotely think this is what I deserve for being such a silly spender? I do not. Instead, I think "You bas*****s" & blame the bank!!
Drive back home, taxi due soon. Had genius idea (admittedly not as 'genius' as having budgeted in the first place).....I could pay the taxi driver by making up the couple of quid in my purse with coins from my 20p coin saver tube thingy. Dashed in, turned it out & yes, I did pay the taxi driver his £6 fare mostly in 20p pieces. I said I hadn't had a chance to get to the cashpoint. Luckily for me, he seemed happy to start the day with a load of change. All fine at the station, as I'd already bought my return ticket in advance. Settled down in my seat to read my book - I always used to take books on train journeys as there was a time in my life when I just seemed to be a weirdo magnet. Anyway, no weirdos this time, just a ticket inspector who looked at my ticket for a suspiciously long time before telling me it was invalid on that particular train & that I'd need to buy a different one. I said I doubted that to be the case, as I'd gone to the bookings office myself in person & booked this ticket a long time in advance & has purchased the ticket recommended by the member of staff. Ticket inspector adamant it's an invalid ticket & that I must buy a new one & of course by then, I had absolutely no money on me, the cashpoint had withdrawn my card & I had no credit card at that time. I didn't have my cheque book with me, & even if I had, back then, you needed your bank card to verify a cheque. I had no option but to tell him in front of all the earwiggers nearby that I had no money on me & was completely unable to pay. He said I was travelling illegally & that as soon as I got to St. Pancras, I must go to the office & replace the invalid ticket. I did report to the office (once I'd managed to find it) & was just about to get to the bit about having no money but that I would shortly be meeting my sister & she would be able to lend me some if it was actually true that I did need to buy another ticket, when he said 'Oh those bloody staff in **************', we've had loads of people like you on Saturday mornings because someone up there hasn't got a clue & keeps selling people the wrong tickets'. He gave me a correct one for my journey home &I didn't have to pay anything, so I finally got to meet my sister................my younger sister, who unlike me was only working part-time in a not brilliantly paid job at the time........& I had to ask her to lend me some money because the bank had stopped my cards due to yet another slide into unauthorised overdraft. So we went to the nearest cashpoint & she lent me £50.
Although this was a very small amount for me on a day trip to London, I spent it all.
When I got back in the evening, I didn't have enough cash left for a taxi home, so I got the bus. I spent most of the journey wondering when the bank would give me my card back & working out how overdrawn I would be once my salary had gone into the bank on pay-day.
I remember feeling really cross with the bank because I couldn't buy a take-away when I got in, & that would have been nice after a long day.
The final insult was seeing three of my numbers come up on that night's lottery & thinking " Oh, that's a good sign, at least I've won £10..............before realising I'd forgotten to buy a ticket!!
I remember this saga as though it was yesterday. It was horrible when my card was retained, embarrassing paying the taxi driver in small change, pretty awful on the train having to admit I had zero money on me & demeaning asking my sister to lend me money as soon as I arrived. But because my head was nowhere near in the right space for an LBM, I saw my role in all of this as more of a victim of circumstance, rather than the perpetrator because of persistent failure to budget & constantly overpending my income.
So, while there were occasions when the light-bulb started to flicker, this wasn't one of them.
Oh my days, I could not go back to those days! Totally love my budget now. Love the control. It's empowering.
If anyone out there is wondering if they can change. Yes, do it! You can!
F x

wishingthemortgaheaway

Wow, what a story Foxgloves, I hope you've repaid your sister.

foxgloves

Wishingthemortgageaway - I did, of course. It was a long time ago. Just one of many occasions the LBM could have struck......& didn't!

Onebrokelady

Reading that seems so familiar, I have a favourite shop I like to go and shop in and one day in town I went for a browse and saw these lovely scented candle melts they are all natural with no nasties in them are shaped like little flowers and come in a cute jar,I had to have them so went to the till where my card was rejected,this was my debit card and I laughed it off and blamed the card for being faulty as I'd had trouble with it in some machines,so out czmenthe trusty credit card and on I went to the bank to check my balance which turned out to be zero,I felt sick because I didn't know where the money had gone,I too blamed the bank,I went in and got a print out of my account and when I checked I had indeed spent all the spare cash in my account,my mantra of "oh it's only a few pounds " had bitten me in the bum because those few pounds add up but because I didn't budget or keep track of my money I had no idea of how many pounds I was spending,sadly this still didn't stop me from spending as I think I went on for another 6 months before I admitted I was in trouble, the scented candle things are still in their jar and have never been used,every time I look at them I am reminded of my irresponsibility,I really need to burn them to justify buying them in the first place

wishingthemortgaheaway

One broke lady, why don't you burn them at set points is your debt free journey?
Depending on how many there are, you could do it at certain amounts paid off or certain % paid off.
And, when you are debt free, you could maybe go out and buy a new candle to celebrate.

Just an idea.

Kantankrus_Mare

Just popping in as one who lurks and is thoroughly enjoying the "debtisodes." :T

Keep up the good work.

foxgloves

OneBrokeLady - Oh my days, those wax melts sound lovely......just the sort of thing I like. I do like WishingtheMortgageaway's idea though, of burning them to mark progress in your debt-free journey. You really will have wasted your money if you don't get to enjoy them. Why not light some next time you have some 'you time' to celebrate the fact that you are being strong & are determined to move forward?
KantankrusMare - Aww, glad you are enjoying the 'debtisodes'. My light-bulb did have a few very rubbish flickers along the way, but those can be a story for another day.

foxgloves

Hello diary readers,
Well, I am being hot on all budget pots this month. Have been meal planning since we first decided to get rid of our debt, but just recently, I've been putting a bit more time & constructive thought into it & it's paying off in budget terms. I suppose it's quite easy to get into the rut of writing 7 meals down on a piece of paper & thinking it's a meal plan? I love cooking & always cook from scratch, so that's no problem. I think they key (as with so many things) is the 'Shop from home first' element. Last week, our grocery shopping came in at £11 under budget & this week, we managed £15 under budget, but I did do a LOT of shopping from home to achieve this:
Sat - Tandoori chicken pieces, bombay potatoes & salad
(Only had to buy chicken, bombay potatoes batch-cooked in slow cooker last week. Salad already in fridge pkus a bit of lambs'lettuce from greenhouse).
Sun - Roast dinner (leftover pork slices in gravy frozen last time we had a pork shoulder....already had potatoes, carrots & apple sauce in stores, just bought a cauliflower).
Mon- Sweet & sour beef with noodles. (Had a spare pepper, carrots, onions & leftover frying steak, just bought pinapple, a stirfry sauce pouch & noodles).
Tues - Jacket potato night.....already got potatoes - the rule on JP night is that you can have what you like on it, as long as we've got it in, so no spend.
Weds- Morrocan beef pie with stir-fried garlic chilli greens (Pie from freezer....only 2 of us so when mr f made it 2 or 3 weeks ago, he made the full 'Serves 4' recipe, but in 2 dishes so as to freeze a spare (so only spend was 1 savoy cabbage).
Thurs- Chunky turkey soup with rolls (free meal.....batch cooked the soup from Christmas turkey leftovers & froze some of the cobs I baked the other day).
Fri - Tuna steak, new potatoes & sweetcorn &/or salad (Tuna from freezer as was one of this March's fish box items, leftover new potatoes from last weekend, plenty of salad already from other meals (just bought 1 tin of sweetcorn).
I also found other possibilities knocking around & came up with other ideas, so rather than find I've forgotten them all by next meal planning day, I've jotted them down at the bottom of the meal planning page in my bullet diary. I've been meal planning since we first decided to tackle the naughty 35k some years ago, but it has defo been worth revisiting it these last couple of weeks to look at it with fresh eyes, if you see what I mean.
Ok....must pop down to the greenhouse now & put my baby chilli plants to bed.
Cheers all,
F x

foxgloves

Oh my giddy aunt......how far have I come over the last ten years? Just done a survey which required me to say if I agreed with various statements about my attitude to money:
"I always know how much is in my bank account".
and of course my answer....given while simultaneously polishing my halo, was "Strongly agree".
A bit different from my broke trip to London back in the day - the story I shared a couple of days ago.
Anyway, my back is stiff from this morning's gardening session, so I shall leave you to get on with your Sundays while I go & run a lovely hot bubble bath.
F x

foxgloves

Morning Monday Debt-busters,
A nice surprise this morning as my Yougov payment had landed in our bank account, so I was able to pay £50 straight across to the Loan Pay-Down Fund. While doing this, I noticed that this fund has also earned a staggering £1.43 interest.......the bank needs to slow down, handing out money like that......if I didn't intend to leave it where it is, I could withdraw that, add £1.07 & buy a whole cup of coffee!
Anyway, the payment was the good thing & means that the paydown fund, which was down to £60 in December, is now at £533, & I'm still waiting for a paypal transfer which will also be added.
Survey earnings so far this year stand at £164.
I've had a nice little harvest from the garden too, today. I lifted the forcing crock & pulled nearly a kilo of pink spring rhubarb. I've cooked it & divvied it up into little pots for freezing. They will be nice healthy snack pots as they only work out at 23 calories each.
Ok, must go & see if the laundry's dry as I can see a big black cloud hoving into view.
Hope you're all getting off to a good start this week,
F x